I’ll never forget the day I took a friend of mine trout fishing. He had spent most of his time fishing in the lakes and was a very successful freshwater fisherman. We were drifting a creek casting for trout when we came by a tree hanging down into the water. He asked me to get him a little closer to the tree so he could cast to it. I quickly pointed out to him that we were fishing in saltwater and to leave that freshwater stuff alone. He persisted so I took him closer and he planted his lure right underneath the tree and caught a nice 2lb trout. It was the only fish we caught that day, but I learned a lesson that changed the way I fish forever.
If you ever listen to freshwater bass fishermen talk about fishing you will generally hear about how fast their boat will run, but the word structure is in just about every one of those conversations. You only hear about structure in saltwater fishing when the bottom fishing boats go out for snapper and grouper or when someone is fishing one of the artificial reefs. The truth of the matter is there is plenty of structure in our inshore and offshore waters alike.
To understand why structure attracts fish you must understand three basic things about fish. Fish have three basic needs. They need shelter, food, and must reproduce in order to survive. When targeting fish it is helpful if you know what type of structure the fish uses for shelter, what type of food they eat, and what time of year they spawn. If you can understand these three things about fish you will be able to know what type of place to fish and what to use for bait.
Structures can be man made or occur naturally. Some examples of man made structure are docks, artificial reefs, jetties, bridges, and sea walls. Natural reefs may be oyster bars, marshes, live bottoms, trees, stumps, and offshore weedlines. All of these structures as different as they are provide shelter and food for all types of fish. So many people fish piers and catch fish, but when they get in the boat they catch little or nothing and t