Well I don't like the appearance of plastic personally but I do think people would prefer a more natural color.
For periphyton, I really like brush. I don't mind snagging brush either. I've sunk a lot when I had lot at the lake and got pretty good at working a jig through and over it for crappie. At the depths I was sinking it at the lot ... however ... I don't think it had a lot of periphyton growing.
A lot of folks don't realize it but rocks add a lot of attachment surface in rocky lakes relative to mud bottom ones. The effect is measurable in experiments. One of the more remarkable was Swingle's results with PK shrimp. Stocking 20 lbs/acre with 1500 BG and under monthly fertilization he grew 1000 lbs/acre of PK shrimp production even after the BG got their fill when brush was added. This was a six fold increase over the treatments without brush. Oddly, no additional production of BG was achieved. I figure they got their fill shrimp under both scenarios.
