Thread: green brush ?

Green trees with leaves seem to take a year or more to sour out and start holding fish. Put one of my best spots in with green leaves on and didn't catch a fish there for almost a year. The next year and after were awesome.
I would only recommend putting trees in with out leaves such as in the winter.
This is just what I like to do, some of the other folks may have different ideas.

Originally Posted by slabbandit

Green trees with leaves seem to take a year or more to sour out and start holding fish. Put one of my best spots in with green leaves on and didn't catch a fish there for almost a year. The next year and after were awesome.
I would only recommend putting trees in with out leaves such as in the winter.
This is just what I like to do, some of the other folks may have different ideas.

I regularly fish a lake where trees occasionally blow down or fall over. If it happens in the spring or summer when they have leaves on, it seems like they won't hardly produce until the next year. I guess the effects of time passage and floods finally get all the leaves off, and then they take off.

Most hardwoods go through a sour and are better the next year. I find Persimmon Trees work quicker for us. Also being a heavy wood green Persimmon trees sink with little or no weight. But ,you need a weight to keep them from getting dragged off by wind, current, or trollers.

The Okla Dept of Wildlife fisheries biologists and staff sink 1,000's of green cedar trees each year for habitat improvement. I asked them your question about how long before they find fish using the newly submerged habitat. One of the senior regional fisheries supervisor with over 30 years of experience who I fish with and consult with on my Pond Mgmt 101 sticky told me that he has dropped trees and electro fished the pile the next day and found fish using the pile. I personally have installed a brushpile with leaves still on the trees and caught fish 2 days later. Think about this for a minute, wouldn't the leaves provide more hiding places for the minnows and fry to hide in from predators? The leaves will provide more surface area for the biomass and algae to grow on until the leaves slough off. When I see a newly fallen tree in a lake or river I go to it rather than shy away because this is fresh structure or habitat. The key here is location, location, location of the brushpile to a certain degree. The concern with the wood souring is a wives tale and does not hold water. The fish might not have been feeding the day you fished the new pile because of an unstable barometer or the pile was below the thermocline and unusable at that time of year. I am not trying to talk down to you just trying to assist you in a better understanding of what is really happening. I hope this helps you.

Cricket , I fish more days than not. The Hardwoods I put in are always better months later. Pallets , dead wood , Persimmons seem to draw fish right away.
I would'nt waste time on Cedar for 3 reasons.

1. The bushy green limbs moss over with algae here and fish can't get in.
2. They hang up because of all the small limbs which then tend to all rot off real quick leaving a trunk.
3. Small fish love thick cover , but for slabs maintain cover with 8'' min spacing. That is what the experts say.

I perfer Persimmon trees or pallet stakebeds with plenty of room for slabs to get in. They seem to last well too.

But use what works on your lake. Here we have off colored water and pvc has not worked very well for us. Some guys fish clear water lakes with little cover swear by it. Nothing works everywhere the same. That's why there are a jillion different baits made.

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For many years I lived in Arkansas about 30 feet from Lake Hamilton. We used Ceder trees for structure weighted with concrete blocks. We would sink them one week end and fish them the next week end and for the remainder of the summer. Big problem was keeping the location hidden.

I don't know about your lakes but where I fish, green cedars or willows attract crappie within days and keep producing for several years. In my opinion, cedar is one of the best attractors and I have been guiding for crappie daily for many many years. I always put my brush out so that it lays flat on the bottom. The crappie don't get under the limbs. They sit on top of the brush. I don't like my brush to sit more than 3 feet off the bottom. I am usually fishing in water from 5 to 14 feet deep. I cleaned 7500 crappie in 07 and 7500 in 08. Those crappie seemed to like that set up.

When Greers Ferry was new for the first several years before the cedars lost their limbs, the cedars were the go to cover to catch crappie.