I have seen some simple structure built with PVC, oak pallets, and other artificial structure. I have personally built a lot of brush piles on Toledo Bend, but all have been built out of Gum trees and willow. Would love to hear your personal experiences, both successful and not so successful

bois d'arc is best because it lasts the longest. It's murder on chainsaw blades, though.

lol everyone will be PM'ing you asking for those brushpile coordinates!!

I've usually kept my brush piles simple just using 1 concrete block and using limbs stuffed in both sides and tying it with rope. sweet gum trees or cedars but also oak limbs or Christmas trees when they are available. I try to make a "U" shape with 5-6 piles usually along a drop-off but works best around a hump. they don't always sink perfect but I at least know I have 1 side open to bring cranks thru before making contact.

I have thought about buckets and PVC pipe as those would last forever and the options and sizes are numerous.

sweet gum trees

I saw a picture of a pallet with irrigation pipe that you buy at Home Depot etc. in 100' rolls. They cut 3' pieces that stay half way coiled and then screwed to the pallet. they roughed up the black plastic irrigation pipe with sand paper and then shoved bamboo, willow, etc. in the end of the pipe. tied a couple concrete blocks to the pallet and then dropped on location. It looked like a bunch of spider legs curved in a big U coming off the pallet with limbs sticking out everywhere. they roughed up the pipe to promote algae growth

I personally prefer to find others brushpiles, and catch fish off of those. A lot less work.

A friend of mine owns a siding and gutter business and gives me scrap for free. Put vinyl siding (bent however you like it) and pieces of gutter into a 5 gallon bucket with cement. Works pretty well!

Willow trees work good, they kinda stay alive for a while when you sink them.

I'm going to make one out of a plastic Ficus (sp) tree. My wife was going to throw it away. Its over 7ft. I plan to add some stuff to it.

I have a buddy that has an Pontoon boat with no rails, he makes and sinks some good brush piles.

Oak pallet....with treated 2x4 about 4-8' (cut 2x4's in half)..long screwed in place so they stand upright...number of stakes up to you....i like some sparse and some with more..... Concrete blocks to sink......i like to put an oak or sweet gum limb with leaves on each pallet too

Thanks txmasterpo, I would have thought maybe the treated woods chemical would have kept them away instead of holding them there.Also do you prefer the oak or the sweet gum

I tried the fake ficus tree already. The glue on the leaves let go about an hour after I sunk it and the limbs came loose soon after. I kept a rope on it to pull it up and see how it did. After one day it was just a single stick.

Structure is a bottom change such as a change in depth. point, hump, ledge ect.

Brush Piles are "Cover" not structure;)

I hate to differ but structure is not bottom change. A bottom change is a drop or ledge, or ridge. Structure is a stump a tree a lay down or like I was asking maybe man made structure. Brush piles are structure also man made

No Structure is the shape of the bottom from deepest to shallowest. On that structure you can have breaks and cover. Read Buck Perry's book. He is the father of structure fishing and needs no help redefining what the terms are.