Like with most posts when things have been explained and repeated over and over in posts, I tend to qualify my comments/advice in my mind and not in the post...I do not deal with stocking southern waters, because I deal with the more cold tolerant Pure Strain of Blue Tilapia and only stock/advise in more northern climates......
As for 4" tilapia easily avoiding LMB in a pond, I am referring to offspring of stocked Blue tilapia that have reached the 4" class....These tilapia grew to that size due to rapid growth and avoiding predation from their quickness..not so much from just getting "lucky". While as Scott said, prey will get chased up onto banks occasionally, and the surviving offspring percentage reaching and exceeding 4" will be low...late season catches of fish that are clearly too small to have been original stockers is my anecdotal evidence of fry survival to adulthood...
Again, these numbers may be low, possibly even insignificant. I have only seen lone 14'+ LMB stalk and attack 4-6" Blues and wind up missing, looking around wondering what happened to their prey....
