The topwater bite has been very sporadic for the last several years.  It is a crap shoot.  I have quit doing it because of the inconsistancy coupled with the price of fuel.  The best way to do it is to motor around the lake the lake at dawn and dusk.  Much of the time I would motor 30+ miles morning and evening in order to find a bite.

You have to be going under 30 mph and running a zig zag pattern to be able to see both sides of the lake.

It used to be that July and August could be counted on but I do a lot of bass fishing that time of the year from civil twilight until around 10:oo am and haven't seen surface action in several years.  I hear that there is some in May but I am night fishing exclusively at that time.

So the bottom line is your guess is as good as mine on time and lake.  SORRY.

In the next few weeks the spawning migration will be in full swing and they can be caught on lots of baits.  I have never tried anything close to a top water other than 3" rebels but I don't like to use them because of the treble hooks.

so its better just to locate a school and vertical jig?

PS.  overall what is the best lake?

I can't say that.  We don't vertical jig very often for whites.  We swim the jigs.  Basically fan casting.  We fish within 5' of the surface this time of year.

Later finding a school has not been something I can do very often unless they surface for a while.

There is no best lake.  Bull Shoals and Table Rock have larger ones because they have good populations of threadfin shad so the fish grow faster and larger.  Pomme de Terre had a tremendous population until 2 years ago but they missed a couple of spawns and are hurting now.  Stockton was low in population until last fall.  The fishery was good there but hasn't been much this spring.

There has been a good bite during the late spring and summer down by the TR dam.  Lots of 4#+ whites have come from there but it is covered with guide boats.

What is good one season won't necessarily be good at other times.  Right now upper Bull Shoals is hot and other places are slow.  On of the best fisheries is below the Truman Dam on upper LOZ.  That is a later bite, sometime in early May.

The most consistant bite for me has been a Stockton mid April to mid May night bite.  If I can't catch close to 100 a night I feel like I have been robbed.  There again it is a water level, water temp, and swim jig thingy.

what kind of structure do you look for?  Just fish on the DF or deep open water points?

I don't understand the question.  Spring/summer/fall  day/night ?  They are all different.

Whites can be had in the spring on main lake points as long as the wind is blowing.  If it isn't windy then forget it.   The main way to catch them in the spring is to go up river.  They spawn at night and will migrate to shoals.  In the daytime they drop back down into deeper holes of water and hang out till dark.  Then they head back to the shoals to spawn.

That is what we did Wed.  We fished in a creek which is a couple of hundred feet wide.  We fished bends and holes.  We did not go far enough to get to shoals because they would likely not be there after daylight.