I'm going to fish Lake Livingston for the first time this next weekend. Does anyone have any tips on where to put the boat in, and navigational advise?

One of the more dangerous lakes to navigate in the state if you ask me because of all of the wood in random deep places. It has a boat lane going into Kickapoo and another going north of the HWY 190 bridge, but that is all the help we get and it is a mine field nearly everywhere else. Here is a link to some guys on another site that has a lot more Livingston info on it, including some waypoints.

https://www.2coolfishing.com/search/716530/?q=livingston+stumps&o=relevance

Thank you for the response. Normally I fish Conroe, but it's getting really crowded. Looking for somewhere else to go somewhat close to home.

I wouldn't waste my time, actually I don't waste my time. I live 15 minutes from the lake and will drive an hr to fish conroe or 1.5HRs to fish Rayburn.

Some recent tournament results.

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It's amazing to me that a lake of that size in Texas could be that bad.

Spent a lot of time on LL. It reminds me of Fork as far as how you run it. Find the boat lanes or just stay in the main channel. Lots of timber. As far as fishing, it's not great. We had most of our success flipping docks and fishing slllooowwwww. I would normally flip a small jig or a wacky worm on a spinning rod. If you can find the white bass running you can slam them. Also a great catfishing lake.

Neglected by the state when it comes to largemouth stocking. The big excuse they like to give is the lack of shoreline structure. Although it is no different than conroe in that regard and it recieves nothing in comparison.

Conroe 20K acres, 2013-Present ~ 1.5 million fingerling
Livingston 90K acres 2013- present ~150K fingerling

It was my favorite lake before they sprayed and killed the hydrilla in the mid 1980's. Now it's a silted in mud hole.

Lived on the lake for many years and fished quite a few derbies. As others have said you can run the river/creek channels no problem however 'open' water does have its fair share of floaters.
North of the 190 bridge stay in the channels.
South of the 190 bridge is much more open. West side has flats that run out to the river channel and when the lake is 3-5' low weekenders run up on sand bars regularly. Super shallow around Pine Island but drops rapidly on the river side.

Boat houses and bulkheads on the southwest part of the lake hold tons of shad and you have to pick through the whites and the occasional blue that will chase a crankbait. Kickapoo can hold fish in spring (midlake east side) but when you get out of the creek channel shut down the outboard and stand on the t'motor.

If you venture up north Palmetto Creek and Pools are easy to hit.

Farther north you can put in out of Trinity and spend a week in White Rock Creek.

Unfortunately it's not the lake it was in the late '70's and early '80's and agree that TPWD has neglected it as a bass lake.

I grew up fishing Livingston in the mid 80's as well when it still had hydrilla. My grandparents had a lakefront house in Aztec Cove which is on the north end of the lake towards White Rock creek. Some of the coves and slews were so clear it was like watching fish swim in an aquarium. Then they sprayed it and it was the dead sea for a few years. Sometimes you could still find patches of peppergrass and those areas were loaded with bass.
The lake has never been good in the cold months for me, but starts getting better around April. The north end of the lake always seemed to pop before the south end. I guess because it is generally shallower and more off color, thus it warms up faster.
A few years back it was taking 18-22 lbs to win a tournament in late spring and early summer, but I haven't been keeping up with results lately so that may have changed. As mentioned earlier, the forage is mostly shad, so I had a lot of luck on chrome/blue traps fished along rip rap but also fire tiger cranks and white spinnerbaits with gold colorado blades when the water got a little more dirty. As for plastics the dock fish love centipedes fished wacky style or on a light texas rig, my grandpa's go to was a black worm with a chartruse tail.
If I were going now I would put in at what used to be Galloway's marina by the 356 bridge where it goes over White Rock. Go under the bridge on the north side and there is always a lot of floating timber, docks and rip rap. The cove by the ramp and bridge rip rap usually produce a few fish as well. Be careful if you try to get into White Rock creek the mouth is pretty silted up, but the creek itself has lots of fishable stuff if you like flipping and pitching. Dad's creek can also produce some nice strings this time of year. A lot of bass spawn in that area as well so it may be getting good now. There are also a couple of spring fed creeks up that way that produce well in the summer months.
PM me if you have any more questions. I saved a couple of maps of spots from when I used to jack pot a few derbies back when I lived in Jasper.

Put in at the state park or Beacon Bay Marina.

Plenty of fish to be caught on that lake. It's not the best by any means, but it is a decent lake to fish

“GETTING” crowded? Bwahahaha…..sorry, just kidding……sort of!

If you don't like the crowd I would try OH Ivie. I hear that lake is like a ghost town!

My parents use to live near the lake spent alot of time from 1990s till about 2015.

It can be difficult to navigate, north of 190. but things change and get silted in, prolly been stuck in the mud more times on this lake than any other. There are places I use to fish that you can no longer fish. Logs rolling down the river create hazards.

I think many struggle with how shallow these bass will get on this lake.