WHAT'S COMING AT LEAVELLWOOD

EDITOR'S NOTE: This week we've been visiting with Trey Montgomery, the owner of one of the nation's leading trophy bass-fishing lodges. Montgomery has great plans for his land and his lakes. Here's some of what you can expect.

QUESTION: You're building a new lake this year. What's it called, and how is it being constructed?

ANSWER: We're calling the new lake Fantasy Island. At the dam, the lake will be about 22 feet deep. In the bottom of the new lake are two major ditches that were already quite eroded before we began to back the lake up. We started to catch water in the lake in June of 1999 and hope to have it full by February 2000. We used an auger to drill holes in the bottom of the lake. Then we put more than 150 cedar trees in the holes and filled the holes with concrete to hold the trees down. Then with a track hoe, we went around the edge of the water line and dug a ditch every 40 feet that was 4 feet wide, 3 to 4 feet deep and 20 feet long. This configuration will give the bass deep-water holes that they can move into during hot and cold weather. Also, we've come out 3 feet from the bank and created a 3-foot shelf, making a ledge. That 3-foot shelf drops off to a 5-foot shelf, which then drops off to a 9-foot shelf to give the lake more structure, which bass love. We've put more than 90 tons of pea gravel on the bottom of this lake, spreading it about every 6 to 8 feet apart on the 5-foot shelf to provide spawning habitat for both bream and bass. We've also created underwater islands and humps and built concrete reefs to insure that our bass have plenty of habitat and our anglers have plenty of places to fish at Leavellwood.

For more information, contact Trey Montgomery, at Leavellwood Lodge, P.O. Box 24, Co. Rd. 117, West Greene, Alabama 35491, (205) 372-2323.

Check back each day this week for more from Trey Montgomery and Leavellwood...

Day 1 - Leavellwood- Home of Trophy Bass
Day 2 - How Leavellwood Raises Trophy Bass
Day 3 - How To Farm Trophy Bass
Day 4 - What's Coming At Leavellwood
Day 5 - What The Future Holds For Leavellwood

John's Journal