Thread: Crappie/Bass brush pile placement advice needed

Depends on your lake,how it is made,how deep, points etc. If you have fished the lake and you know where the fish are place them there. Points are always a good place to start place from shallow to deep water down the point on both sides. That way you can fish from shallow to deeper water to find them on your trees all year long. Place trees in shallow water on sides and stand them up in the deeper water. Best way to help keep them in upright is to put in buckets with 2'to 3' rebar through the bottoms in a x shape then pour concrete and sink in deep water. Most people use concrete blocks as they are easier to tie to than just chunks of concrete and use zip ties to tie to them just drill holes through center of trees at base. The more trees in a group is best. But have more places fixed to fish is also a plus. Like I said to start with it depends on the lake and how you want to place them. Good luck and be safe when sinking these wear your PFD and take a friend as you can go to the bottom with the concrete weight real fast if something goes wrong.

CWill
So what does your lake need? Is it a small or large lake? Does it have plenty of food for the Crappie?
I ask because Christmas trees are a short lived cover....they tear up and degrade fast if you fish them...Within a year or two, you pretty much just have the main trunk left!
You have TWO ways to do this....number one is cover for Crappie....look at a tree, how many fish will that 1 tree realistically hold...then you get an idea how many an entire area of 20 trees will hold....so in 2 years you may have 20 trunks and a few limbs....IMHO, I would stand them up and lump them all in a group, that will get you a large area to fish for a while....then you can add other cover in areas around, and build new areas.

The second way to use this many trees, is to use them as shallow laydowns for minnows, baitfish, craws, and micro-organisms....make sure they are in water during the winter drawdowns, you don't want them to dry out or freeze/thaw!
Since the laydowns won't be fished, they don't suffer as much damage from pulling hooks free, etc., and they will last longer and provide extra years as cover for CRAPPIE FOOD! This is the first building block for an entire HEALTHY fishing ecosystem! Then put other long lasting cover in for the Crappie!

If you stand the trees up, put them in buckets of Concrete (like Scrat suggested), or in a Concrete block, we used vinyl coated cable and clamps to attach, so they couldn't come loose (We have a dam, and a lot of boats)...or you can use 250lb tie straps, HD Trimmer Line, etc, if you do not have to worry about boats, dams, or them coming loose in high or moving water!
For laydowns, your slab concrete can be attached to the trunks, most times 1 slab/block will hold 2 laydown trees, safely in the shallows.

Good Luck and Good Fishing!

Originally Posted by INTIMIDATOR

CWill
So what does your lake need? Is it a small or large lake? Does it have plenty of food for the Crappie?
I ask because Christmas trees are a short lived cover....they tear up and degrade fast if you fish them...Within a year or two, you pretty much just have the main trunk left!
You have TWO ways to do this....number one is cover for Crappie....look at a tree, how many fish will that 1 tree realistically hold...then you get an idea how many an entire area of 20 trees will hold....so in 2 years you may have 20 trunks and a few limbs....IMHO, I would stand them up and lump them all in a group, that will get you a large area to fish for a while....then you can add other cover in areas around, and build new areas.

The second way to use this many trees, is to use them as shallow laydowns for minnows, baitfish, craws, and micro-organisms....make sure they are in water during the winter drawdowns, you don't want them to dry out or freeze/thaw!
Since the laydowns won't be fished, they don't suffer as much damage from pulling hooks free, etc., and they will last longer and provide extra years as cover for CRAPPIE FOOD! This is the first building block for an entire HEALTHY fishing ecosystem! Then put other long lasting cover in for the Crappie!

If you stand the trees up, put them in buckets of Concrete (like Scrat suggested), or in a Concrete block, we used vinyl coated cable and clamps to attach, so they couldn't come loose (We have a dam, and a lot of boats)...or you can use 250lb tie straps, HD Trimmer Line, etc, if you do not have to worry about boats, dams, or them coming loose in high or moving water!
For laydowns, your slab concrete can be attached to the trunks, most times 1 slab/block will hold 2 laydown trees, safely in the shallows.

Good Luck and Good Fishing!

Thanks for the info INTIMIDATOR. So out of curiousity would it hurt or help me if I was to say put 6 trees in an area about 20ft in diameter with half of them layed down and the other half stood up?

Just make a forest with that many have fun with it try different things and just keep adding. Good luck with it

Originally Posted by Andrews

Just make a forest with that many have fun with it try different things and just keep adding. Good luck with it

That was my initial thought Andrews but m local lake has very little structure other than brush piles that others have put out over the years. Its pretty easy to put around and find piles that others have put out and if I use all the trees in one spot I doubt it would be long before easy Joe Blow on the lake knew about it. I think I will make 5 different piles with 5 trees in each pile.

Ok I see,I don't know your situation. I have got some really good ideas from this section of forums, putting structure has become addicting to me.

My lake is about 21,000 sq/acres which is small for Texas. but they released a bunch of grass Carp a few years back to thin the vegetation growth a bit. Well lets just say they over shot the number of Carp released and they have completely wiped out all the vegetation. So other than ledges, creek bends, docks, etc... Basically the only structure to fish offshore is brush that people have put out which makes it very easy to find if you know how to use your electronics. I wish there was alot of grass and such to fish but there is not. I like the huge brush pile idea but as I said the whole lake would know about it within a month where as if I put a few small ones in places they might not all get "Hammered" daily. The few big brush piles that are on this lake ALWAYS have boats on top of them which to me just means they are getting fished too hard.

CWill

Josh (Andrews) built a sustained ecosystem on his lake and it is IMPRESSIVE....the quality of fish is amazing and it continues to replenish itself.

You can make 5 piles with 5 trees...no need to wait for them to dry out, I prefer them to stay green and flexible as long as possible....the resin becomes inert and causes no issues, same with the leaves.

IF YOU DO NOT WANT YOUR AREAS FOUND.....I would use all of the trees as laydowns and then build some of the Big pole PVC cover and Milk Crate Condo's...Plastic, if built right, pretty much disappears in water!