"One of the reasons I fish the river arms in reservoirs is because you get shade when the sun changes position," added Dobyns. "Whenever there's shade, there will be bass. You can throw topwater in these spots and do extremely well."

FLOATING VEGETATION
Many anglers are intimidated by floating vegetation. Bass pro Kent Brown believes that targeting floating vegetation is a sure way to generate strikes when throwing topwater. As with buoys, docks, floating restrooms and timber, floating vegetation draws bass in.

"People overlook it. They've never had much success presenting a bait to the fish without getting hung up, so they don't do it. They get sick of catching a wad of grass," he said. "The West was really the spawning grounds for frog fishing. It's a place where anglers think all we do is drop-shot, but we have a lot of vegetation, so the frog has been a bait that we do a lot of fishing with. And it's the best bait to fish floating vegetation with."

Some anglers, though, approach vegetation the wrong way.

"I try to start by going around it, because a lot of times you can pull a fish out of open water that will come out from under the vegetation. If your first couple of casts is through the vegetation, you take a chance at spooking those fish. You try to fish the perimeter, and if it doesn't work, then you go in after them," said Brown, who casts a River 2 Sea Bully Wa frog, a topwater weedless frog.

However, Brown also recommends throwing Zara Spook-type baits near floating vegetation. Buzzbaits can also be effective in these areas.

"When you have high sun, the fish will go to any shade. Everything is about blocking the sunlight off their eyes, and that happens when they are under floating vegetation," Brown added.

DOCKS
It's no secret that docks harbor as many bass as floating vegetation and mats. The higher the sun is, the more likely bass will be taking refuge in these areas. When fishing any body of water with docks, it's a good idea to spend a bulk of your time casting topwater baits near the docks.

"I like the shade line and they are protected. I'll throw a Spook to the back of the dock and let it sit there before I start working it," says two-time Bassmaster qualifier Greg Gutierrez. "I'll throw it to the back of the dock, as far as I can go. A lot of times, they'll come out from underneath. A lot of times, I find that the fish are positioned to look back toward the bank, so I throw it all the way to the bank and bring it toward them."

Throwing alongside, under and across the end of docks shouldn't be overlooked when tossing topwater. Docks, Gutierrez added, "are magnets. They are the one chunk of structure where fish congregate. They are concentrated more around docks than they are in other areas. It tends to suck them in more."