how do you find structure

[Carrington]

i am wondering how you find structure in a lake such as timber and other things in deep water.  i have side imaging but am i just supposed to idle around the lake and hope i get lucky and find something?

[Big Tom]

If you can, try to find a good topographical map of the lakes you fish.  That will give you a huge advantage in locating structure.

The land surrounding the lake is a good place to start looking.  You can find points this way.  Also, if the land is relatively flat as it meets the water, chances are the area is a flat or is at least relatively shallow.  This may also mean that banks with steep hills may be deeper than those mentioned above.  Idle around these areas with your fish finder until you locate drop offs and such. 

[sage]

This is the hardest thing to do but it works for me. I have a Humminbird 997si. I leave the rods in the truck spend the first few hours scanning the lake and marking way points. After I have located enough spots I get the rods out and start hitting the different spots. If the rods are in the boat when I do this It is easy for me to get side tracted and instead of exploring I will fall back to old spots and start fishing.

[gobig]

Understanding the difference between structure and cover is key. Structure is the bottom of the lake. Bill Murphy's book described it best in my mind. " If you turned over a smooth aluminum bowl and beat it with a heavy object, the resulting bumps and depressions on the inside of the bowl would be comparable to the high spots, ridges, and depressions found on the bottom of structured lakes."Trees, stumps, docks, vegetation and so on... are all cover elements. In structured lakes cover is secondary to primary structure (points, ridges, humps, flats and creek channels) but adds value in the right relation. Especially when targeting bigger fish.

Finding key structure requires doing some homework. The best place to start is at home before you ever get to the lake. Follow these links and watch the videos. This is some of the most informative stuff I have found on researching bodies of water.

http://www../fishing-videos/*-mapping/

http://www../fishing-videos/spacenavigator-review/

The next step is actually getting out on the water and locating the points, ridges, humps, flats and creek channels that you found in your research. These areas need to be gone over with a fine tooth comb. Many times its not the obvious prominent structure that harbors the larger fish is the subliminal structure. Pick these places apart and you will find the spot with in the spot.

[Matt Fly]

YES! yes is the answer with SI.   You shouldn't have to drive very far to find something with SI.

    You can cover 10x more water on one pass than most.

   SI will show things that aren't on the map.   west of the 515 bridge on Fork is house foundation with two car garage driveways clear as day, map or my Lowrance never showed that.

[Raul]

Timber is not structure, it 's cover. Structure is the bottom contour.

Speaking about bottom contour, sometimes you can see it, sometimes you can deduct how it must look like from looking at the contour of the terrain above water level, other times there are clues like certain species of trees ( knowing where they grow ) and aquatic plants, observation and what can you deduct from it tell you what 's underneath water level.

Things like topo maps ( when available ) are great tools for finding structure, good electronics also help.