Topwater frogs and toads
The only way to fish water that is more plant than water.
What it is
A hollow body frog has a soft collapsible shell with the hook points tucked flat against the back, so it walks over matted vegetation without fouling. A soft plastic toad or buzz frog has kicking legs and rides on a weighted or weightless hook, and is fished faster and more open.
When to throw one
Summer, and specifically over slop, pads, hydrilla mats and duckweed. Also snakehead and bowfin in canal systems, and peacock bass around shoreline cover. Nothing else lets you present a bait over a solid green mat.
How to fish it
Walk a hollow body in open pockets and pop it in holes. Over a solid mat, drag it and stop it in every opening. On a toad, just retrieve steadily so the legs churn. Either way, wait for weight before you swing.
Gear that matters
Heavy braid, no leader, and a heavy rod. You are pulling fish out of vegetation, and this is one of the few situations where sixty five pound braid is a reasonable choice rather than an overreaction.
Swinging at the blow up. Count one full second after the explosion, feel the fish, then load up hard.
Topwater frogs and toads by the numbers
- Families in the catalog
- 110
- Individual variants
- 652
- Brands represented
- 36
- Weight range
- 1/8 oz to 1.5 oz
- Length range
- 0.25 in to 4 in
- Most stocked color families
- Watermelon, Silver and Blue, Black and Blue
A family is a product line. A variant is one color and size of it, which is the level the app actually reasons about.
What the shelves carry
Shelf availability, not a recommendation. Which color is right depends on the day, and that is the part the app works out.
Topwater frogs and toads with the deepest color runs
The families carrying the most individual variants in the catalog. Breadth of stock, not a ranking of which one catches more fish.
What a web page cannot know
Everything above is true of topwater frogs and toads everywhere, in every month, for every angler. That is exactly the problem with it. Cobia answers the narrower question.
Those four lines need a location, a clock and your actual tackle box. No website has any of them.
Topwater frogs and toads questions people actually ask
A hollow body frog has a soft collapsible shell with the hook points tucked flat against the back, so it walks over matted vegetation without fouling. A soft plastic toad or buzz frog has kicking legs and rides on a weighted or weightless hook, and is fished faster and more open.
Summer, and specifically over slop, pads, hydrilla mats and duckweed. Also snakehead and bowfin in canal systems, and peacock bass around shoreline cover. Nothing else lets you present a bait over a solid green mat.
Walk a hollow body in open pockets and pop it in holes. Over a solid mat, drag it and stop it in every opening. On a toad, just retrieve steadily so the legs churn. Either way, wait for weight before you swing.
Swinging at the blow up. Count one full second after the explosion, feel the fish, then load up hard.
Know which frog to tie on
Scan your receipts, build your box once, and Cobia ranks what you already own against the water in front of you.
Android coming soon
iPhone, iOS 17 or later. Setup takes about a minute.