First topwater bite of the year

[L a r r y]

Well, the spawn is pretty much over for us here in North Texas, temps are starting to come up in the 80's and hold over night in the 70's at times.  I went out to a new pond I've been scouting over the last couple of weeks and it has yielded me my two biggest fish of the year so far.  So I decided to head out for some time on the water before it got too dark.  Well I get there and start looking for a spot on the bank that I will not be standing in 2 feet of mud.  I start the search for the fish.  No bites coming off the bottom, nothing in the middle of the water column, nothing on slow moving topwater, no spinner bait bites, no crank bait bites, so right when I start my 5 more cast countdown, I throw on a 1/4 buzz bait.  I start casting and I slow roll the first two casts with nothing, so three more casts....darnit c'mon fish, jump on this thing.  I start the retrieve off a little bit faster and get about 20 feet from the bank....wham....missed it...short strike.  So I have two more casts left and I decide to throw to the left of where I missed it.  Nothing on that cast, one last cast, a little bit further left, get about 25 feet from the bank......HUMONGOUS EXPLOSION....FISH ON.  I'm fishing in matted hydriilla so it starts to torpedo down into this slop, good ole power pro helped me out.  I play her out for a few seconds, then she surfaces and I can see this log floating to the top.  I had to pull her up through weeds, freshly mowed grass and rubbish.  But to say, this is my biggest catch of the year so far, since it was dark, I tried to snap a few pics with my flashlight in my mouth with my camera phone, pictures are definitely shotty, but you can see the outline of the fish and what the scale said she weighed.  I measured her up against my rod and when I got home, she measured just tad bit over 21" and went 4.62lbs

[avid]

cool stuff,

I was hoping for a topwater bite last week but it didn't happen...