How tall should the pvc or whatever I choose to use be?
does it matter a whole lot what you use?

I build these and they're about 5ft tall.

Scott Solis
CrappieMaster

Yep, about 5 feet works for me.

recycling is good for the enviroment! your also helping raise the lake level everytime you drop one in.

depends on the depth of water. Make it tall but not so tall it creates a danger. Brush piles fall down and fall apart over time but the pvc last forever. If the lake level falls you dont want anyone getting hurt on it. Even short 2ft condos and brush will hold fish in the right spot.

Here's a recent post about one of mine.
http://texasfishingforum.com/forums/ubbthreads.php/topics/3879773/It_may_be_ugly#Post3879773
Grapevine goes up and down pretty often so I put it in 20ft. It's now at 17ft and producing keepers off the top.

While we put the brush piles down mainly to atract crappie does anyone find that it also helps produce cats and also about how long does it take for a new pile to start to produce fish.

Thanks,Richard

Now that's funny right there.....

I have a buddy that builds condo's, it generally takes about two weeks to really start attracting the fish, however we have caught fish off these things in a couple of days.

"Brush piles fall down and fall apart over time but the pvc last forever."

I wonder what the consequences could be over many years of placing these into our lakes? I can't imagine how many of these structures are on the bottom already. One would think that after a while (because they last forever) there would be so many that they would become less effective. Please don't bash me for asking, just curious and wanted to get your thoughts.

I have had the same thoughts about this and I really don't know how many of the artificial ones are in the lakes and I guess there is really no good way to find out. So I guess the best thing to do would be to promote the natural brush piles instead of the artificial.
Where do we start?

Look at some of Ernest Paty's SI images. Whole trees still stand under Lewisville. Logs and brush are there too from when they were cut decades ago. They still salvage timber out of rivers left from last century. Now, a determined redneck with a good anchor and strong rope can scatter any pile no matter what it's made of.

Thanks for all the info and input from everyone.

Thanks,Richard