I have the chance to get several old concrete man-hole or meter tubes. They are about 3' long and 1.5' diameter. I think I'll have to put them in 9-10 feet of water so that they don't grow over with weeds.

My question is should I lay them on their sides so that they act as horizontal caves, or should I try to stand them up. I think if I lay them over I'll run them parallel to the bank so that jigs and lures will slide over them instead of hanging up on the lips. If I stand them up they could make for some nice vertical jigging spots. Target species will be large mouth bass or crappie.

Do you have catfish in the lake?

If so, do you want them to have better spawning habitat?

Any cavity-spawning fish in your lake will enjoy those concrete tubes.

However, I don't know if they can be placed too deep for catfish to utilize?

There are catfish but they aren't a concern for me as I can catch all the catfish I want on the creek. I want big bass. If I can put these in in a way that either helps bass get bigger, or attracts the biggest bass in the lake to them then I'll be happy.

If you put them in horizontally, then I think you will get more catfish production.

Is that good or bad?

Baby catfish can grow rapidly and become "right-sized" snacks for trophy bass.

However, baby catfish can grow rapidly and start consuming the BG that are feeding your trophy bass.

The correct answer is way above my pay grade!

No need to put them all in the same orientation. You could put some vertical for Crappie cover, and some horizontal for catfish.
Push the horizontal tubes into the bank to close off one end. They won't snag because they're concrete and won't hold a hook, IMO.
Place the vertical tubes onto a solid plastic barrier (garbage can lid) to prevent them sinking into the bottom mud.
If there is any swimming in the pond, be sure they're out of the swimming lane, or put them deeper than 5' so swimmers don't kick them.

Interesting that I had it in my head to do them all the same. Mixing it up is always a good idea! I guess I was just looking for "best" from experienced people. We do swim in the pond a lot but there is a section that I tell people to stay out of due to the habitat we've sunk. These things will go strictly into the no swim zone.

I put several dump truck loads of old pvc pipe that I got from a pipe supply place from 6 to 12" c900 waterline, heavy wall pipe, I cut it with a chain saw into 4 ft chunks and just dumped it into the edge of the pond, I didnt have it in time to place it before the pond got full. the fish seam to love it, I catch fish in that area quite a bit. this is in anywhere from 3ft of water to 10 ft I would guess.

Grabbed some of the concrete today. Next question is how the hell do I get it on a boat and placed? The tubes aren't light... but are awkward as hell.

Rope through the tube with a barrel on each end to float them?

I think you can find an approximate weight for the concrete tubes on the net, as well as the buoyancy provided by each drum. The weight of the concrete in water, should be reduced by about 36% due to their displacement.


Other option: Draw down your pond when you see a good rain coming and plant them using a tractor, skidsteer, etc.

Third option: Put a chain through the tube and tie a rope on each end of the chain. Could you roll the horizontal ones in place down the slope of your shoreline using 2-3 guys for muscle?

This is going to be tough and potentially dangerous.

A jon boat may not be stable enough.

A rope and barrels may be the ticket. Maybe our mini-pontoon boat. No doubt whatever I try it will be dangerous.

If you could get them onto the pontoon boat, you could maybe roll them off, but then you'd be hoping for the best on placement and orientation.

Do some of those go 100 lbs or more?

I think they go more than 100lbs but didn't weigh them. They are awkward more than anything. The first try will be a learning experience!

Video might be worth while....

And accepting the award at the 2023 Oscars for best Humorous Short Film ...

... its catscratch and Sunil!

Could possibly qualify for Darwin awards too!

I'm definitely hoping you experiment enough on how to handle these buggers that no one gets close to any Darwin awards!

I've done lots of stupid things.....so I'm not sure how much help I can lend here.

I'm certain I would end up under one of those pipes at the bottom of the pond.

The full pipe sections could be rolled into 2 to 3 foot of water. I'd put a rope through them first (not tied, just through the pipe) to use as a method of control so they don't roll deeper than you want. All the while have a buddy holding onto the two ends of the rope. Then, approach it with the pontoon and see how easy it is to lift off the bottom. 100 to 150 pound should not be to bad to lift up a few inches and tie it off to the boat....back the boat out to where you want to place it, lower it down, then let loose of one end of the rope and pull up on the other.

Horizontal versus vertical placement might be difficult, but I'd go for the hole being horizontal (pipe laying on it's side) and if a few ended up vertical...so be it.

Consider leaving the rope on the first one placed with a milk jug tied to it so you know where it is for bunching more around it if bunching is your plan. Remove the jug once done...or tie a cheap duck decoy to it so you know where there are.

I would hesitate doing this with my 12 foot boat (hesitate...lol), but a mini-pontoon and a buddy for driving the boat and ballast weight would work well I'd think (given the pipes don't weigh too much).

FWIW I have found that milk jugs have a half-life as a float of around 6 months, before breaking up into multiple pieces that distribute themselves around the pond.

2-liter bottles emptied of Diet Mountain Dew have lasted two years and still counting.

Quarter Acre and Fishinrod win the most logical and safe methods (ie - boring) introduced so far. They may have ruined any chance that a video would be worthwhile.

If I were to mark them it would be with boat buoys. I don't want trash floating around.

You could try to incorporate some explosive propulsion methods maybe??

Tannerite?
Or maybe I could consult a gender reveal specialist the best way to blow something up!

If you need some help, I live about 30 minutes from you and just retired so I’m always looking for something to keep me busy. Feel free to PM me.

That's a great offer! Thanks!
I sent you a personal message...

Tannerite? Will there be beer? Can I come to watch?

I am pretty sure we all want a videographer to be present for this event.

How good are your "cameraman" skills while still holding a beer?

Rhetorical questions? Of course there will be beer!

I am pretty sure the buoyancy of two empty kegs would be sufficient to float a concrete tube into place.

I like it when a plan really comes into focus!

If the kegs are full to begin with and need to be emptied first...we need a lot more help just to get started or I won't be worth a hoot when it comes time to set the structures...lol

Everyone needs a purpose in life.
My purpose is to serve as a bad example.

Like a counter-weight of some sort?

Like beer and explosives and don't try this at home kids. lol

Get Sunil involved. He is really good when bad ideas are happening.

Came home with another load of these tubes. I think I have 13 of them now plus a lot of "curved" rubble that I plan on leaving in shallows for crawfish habitat.

Still undecided on how and where I'm going to place the tubes but I'm thinking a pile of them just past the weed line in front of a point I made would be a good idea. Water depth would be around 9' deep there. A single layer on bottom would put structure at about 7' deep. If I can stack them double somehow the pile would jut up to about 7'. No clue if I can make that work but I think it would hold fish. If I sunk a couple of cedar trees or hedge limbs next to it I think it will work out nicely.

They're going to make great structure, but I have to assume they'll be laying flat on the pond basin, and not standing upright as you had indicated you'd like some of them to.

If my assumption is correct, I think they would be best utilized in 4-5' of water. That's not to say that they couldn't do great in 7' of water, but depending on the type of fishing you'll do, sometimes you can't the lures down that low.

Help me out with ideas on depth...
The vegetation growing in my pond consumes everything shallower than 8ft. I didn't think it would be good to put the structures in the weeds so that's why I've picked the depth I have... it's the shallowest I can put them without having them covered. Should I consider putting them in the weeds?

I would consider a few in the weeds. Bass are ambush predators. Consider a tube suppressing the weeds under its footprint. A LMB could lurk in the tube and ambush any forage fish that ventures forth from the nearby weed beds.

Maybe even "spill" some of your rubble in front of either end of the tube. That might create a little more open water to throw a lure and the LMB could also ambush crayfish out of the rubble.

Another option to consider is to experiment. Place a few this year in different habitat scenarios. Determine which are the best fish enhancements and then repeat those scenarios next year with your remaining tubes.

P.S. Your life insurance agent accidentally left a message at my work number today. Something about needing all of your premiums paid up in full before installation work begins on the concrete tubes?

Despite all the wonderful suggestions about floating them with beer kegs, which I'm sure would work without a single glitch, I might add a suggestion or two.

If you stick them vertically if the bottom is sealed off the water inside will mostly be anoxic, devoid of oxygen. I scuba dive and here in Bonaire in the ocean I have occasion to dive where large pipe pilings have been driven into the ocean floor. I always shine my light down inside them but I never see any fish or critters over a foot or so down into them. On down in the pipe is devoid of most life.

My ideal way to stack them would be three (or more) horizontal straped together on the pond floor with a ratchet strap. Then stack 2 on top in the valleys between them, then one on the top. Tee pee style. How you get them down in the water and in place...........well that is a trick. A telehandler, trackhoe, or some similar large hydraulic crane type thingy along with appropriate sling would be just wonderful to have for an hour or two.

Life insurance is all paid up! For some reason the wife has always been a stickler on that one.

Hadn't even considered creating a dead zone in the tube with it sealed to the bottom. Good point!

I might try to put a couple in the weeds just to see what happens and if they are fishable. The tee-pee idea is ultimately what I think would be best. Not sure I'll ever be able to snag the equipment with that kind of reach but maybe I can muster it by hand and friends.

Depending on your bank and slope where you are going to put them, might be able to "roll" them down by hand (staying on the up side of course) to the bottom or a ledge or post driven into the pond bottom. Roll by hand several down into a cluster.

Then if they are not so heavy so you can lift one end, end it up on top and move it down the ling. If you can lift one end, might be that two stout guys could manipulate them in the water as long as they were not too deep to stand on the bottom.

I still feel that some kind of video will be needed to 'document' this daring attempt at structure placement.

If the pond isn't too wide run the rope to the opposite bank and pull the tubes into place with the motor vehicle of your choice.

No chance of running a rope, it's way to wide (600 feet).

I might be able to role them across the bottom but my boy tried to role one through some mud. It was heavy enough the mud just pushed up in front of it and created mud wedge that stopped it. I could see this being a problem in shin deep muck.

I'm considering a couple of 2 inch oil field pipes with 2x4's strapped between them. Make a 3 foot wide ramp from my stone point out to the weed line and carefully role them into position (staying uphill of them of course).

I can't wait for the water to warm up and for me to get some more daylight time to tinker with this!

Old thread but I finally put out my concrete man holes. I have to apologize as there was some speculation that this project would surely involve beer and likely actions that would make a great bloopers real. Unfortunately nothing much went wrong and certainly nothing comical. Today I took advantage of the once every few yrs cold snap and just rolled them out on the ice.

It didn't go without incidents; the first one shatter when it the ice, the second one broke in half and put a pretty good crushing on my foot, and the third one rolled out very nicely.... then caught the wind and rolled right back to bank. I eventually hobbled around and got all of the ones I didn't break and/or get unstuck out on the ice. Wish I had a bunch of trees ready to put out there with them!

Either you have a waterproof phone, OR you survived the Great Concrete Culvert Placement Project of 2024!

Good job.

I wonder if your channel cats are going to spawn in those this spring?

Back when you were first talking about placing those things I was thinking that's gonna be a complicated process, if them suckers weigh as much as I think they do, they will pretty much land on the bottom almost any way they damn please, and trying to position them will be tough, unless it was done before the water was in the area.
Did you think to tie a concrete block to em to make sure they sink?

I got several dump truck loads of heavy, C900 water main line in various sizes up to 16" dia, but most in the 12" range, cut into 4' lengths dumped into the pond in several places. and the channel cat seem to be spawning in the pond, Im assuming in those pipes, if one end landed in the mud with the other end open that would make a great spawn site for them.

They are as heavy as you might think, and just getting them on a boat and into the water would have been a huge pain in the ass! Fortunate to have the pond freeze this winter.

Lol, no cinder blocks. It won't matter how they land on the bottom, it's a done deal as I'm not touching them again.

No clue if cats will spawn in them. My only hope is that they attract big bass and crappie, channels aren't a goal for me. Might be a consequence though.

Those piles of water main sound like a lot! Did you add any vertical cover with them? I'm planning on cedar and hedge being sunk on top of and around the tubes.

Totally jealous. Those look fantastic!!!

The CC spawning is more of a consequence then a benefit, I added them to my pond early, thinking that with a little feed they would make catching and table fare early on while my other fish eco is developing, and it worked, I was catching and eating fish within a yr, but now I find younger ones that had to have spawned in the lake, Oh well, the otters need something to eat, maybe they will attack them and leave my good fishing alone.

No I didn't place them at all, just backed up to the edge of the pond and dumped them in, wherever and however they landed was how they are, I do have tons of brush, stumps and logging treetop brush piles for plenty of cover. I do think the concrete pipes you put in there will make some awesome permanent cover.

I'll put lines of trees on and outside of the tubes (radiating out from that point like a wagon wheel). That way bank fishermen can cast along a line adjacent to the brush and have their lure pass by several trees on each return. Hopefully it attracts AND grows some nice fish. I LOVE to catch 14+ inch crappie, the kids love to catch big bass...

Good eatin', and good fun. Sounds like paradise!

Just to be clear... I said I love catching them, doesn't mean I'm good at it. But yes, I am in paradise.

You haven't really lived till you've caught a big mess of 14" crappy, and the fact that you actually need to eat the tasty suckers, to keep them from over populating, is like really good icing on the best cake out there.
I love to catch some big old bass, after Ive caught all the crappy that me and my family can eat, and that is quite a few.

They do taste great! Remove and clean every one ya can! I'm a fan of fresh fish but won't turn down a freezer crappie.

The wife sent a pic this morning. They've started melting through! Be there's nothing but a hole by this afternoon!