When Fork was young and the timber was still standing tall with tops and limbs down in the water around the trunks, what's different now about how you pattern fish from back then?

Its not so much the wood as it is the channel swings and drops near the wood. Instead of fishing an entire area of stumps look for the ones near a depth change etc.

What is the difference ? almost everything is different

Interesting observation. If you had all the original structure back in the lake this would still be your approach?

I'm asking this to help me and hopefully others to learn the difference in how to fish a heavily timbered young lake verses an older one where a lot of the wood has decayed.

There has to be a reason why the fish will migrate and hold on stumps no matter their age. Whether bait or gamefish the fact that there is a fish "highway" nearby is a huge bonus.

I haven't fished it in years. I grew up on it and all I ever fished was timber. Then hydrilla came, and now everyone fishes more offshore stuff. Evolution.

Tree tops, limbs and broken off huge trees do not float forever. They are all still in the lake somewhere. These are gold mine places because they tend to pile up in strategic places. Find them and the fishing will be super in those spots. My guess is there are more piles on the North shore than anywhere else.

Don't forget, just because you can't see them doesn't mean they aren't there. Those trees don't have tops, but they're still underwater. I would have loved to have been out there in the day. I can imagine the additional shade provided by the leaves would've been heaven for bass!

I've noticed a lot of older timber lakes don't have nowhere nearly as much bottom structure such as tops and limbs as very young ones do. I think this is due largely to oxidation and decay that it had before it ever broke of the trunk. While graphing young lakes I notice that there's an abundance of structure not attached to the trunk below the surface and older lakes have very little with the exception of bigger logs lying on the bottom.

I agree that structure in a strategic location would be prone to hold fish over other structure. On the other hand structure that has an abundance of algae growing on seems more likely to attract bait fish. This algae producing structure is what I notice more of in the down timber of a young lake. With an abundance of structure in the water I look for the areas that have the most algae producing cover and target the thicker cover.
Some areas timber will have little to no algae and even though there's plenty of cover for ambush, won't produce as many fish. Two points in different areas that are very similar will have opposite results and I think this is the reason why.

If we think of baitfish as cattle then as they graze a place off they'll move on to better feeding.

Structure refers to various features of the bottom of the lake such as river and creek channels, points, humps, ledges, ridges and such. Timber is a form of cover and it does, of course, decay over time. Limbs and tree tops broken away from dry rot will decay much faster than the stumps left over that have remained submerged since the lake filled.

Yes structure and cover are two different things.

Structure= bottom contours and depth changes.

Cover= trees, brush, grass, boulders, etc.

I know we have been through this a hundred times, but we get new members who may not know!

So back to my main question what do you do differently in a young heavily timbered lake verses a much older one.

As a guy who fished fork from 86-90 and 93-2000... I've been maybe a handful of times since. I've fished much like Mark said, the channel swings with trees lining the creeks. I remember doing this back in 87 learning how to jig fish with mark Stevenson. He taught me how to read a map and what to look for while fishing the creeks...

But you mention fishing a young lake... That brings me to Ray Roberts... I have fished that lake since it was new and yes having the green trees with leaves, made a difference to me. It was easier finding the humps back in those days, just look for the tallest trees. As a lake ages, trees fall down, decay etc... Do I think the fish move? Not on Ray Roberts, I have a couple of humps I still fish to this day, that holds good quality fish at different times of the year. I have some old road beds that were lined with cedar trees back in the early 90's that were phenomenal but unless the lake is at a certain level, it's not that good.

I miss both lakes from their early days, if I knew then what I knew now, I'd be a better fisherman.

But what I would change????
Boat positioning
Presentation (God knows every bass on Roberts and Fork) has seen every style of jig, brush hawg or tx rigged worm.
With today's advances on electronics, it's easy to see what's down there and why they are there still.

Yes sir.....so you look for cover near structure first......and the creeks are the highways.....