I was taking a walk at dusk at a udl and was saw thousands of cinder worms going nuts in the water. I have only bore witness to this phenomenom a few times. It's quite a sight. I have seen it mostly in mid May. Is this early for the worms to be out?

I also saw what appeared to be striper dorsal fins lazily moving about the swarms of worms. No explosive gulping like I have seen elsewhere just moving about feeding. They can be hard to catch with such an abundance of natural bait around but I find the 3 inch sluggo works well.

Yes your right mid May to mid June

and the 3 inch pink slug-gos work great

you can even take a black sharpie and make the front black