Professionally the best evaluation is by a fisheries biologist with proper equipment that usually means electroshocking equipment. Electroshocking does have its bias in fish sampling.
IMO the best economical way to evaluate the lake for sportfish is to fish it with a wide variety of methods and lures. Wide variety is very important to provide the best results. Wide variety means all types of live bait and various lures - types and sizes. Each lure type and how it is fished has an inherent bias toward collecting certain species.
Knowing well the panfish and forage fish populations is very important. MOST IMPORTANTLY RECORD EVERY FISH SPECIES CAUGHT, ITS LENGTH & BAIT USED. Angler surveys are a very good way to check the species and most common sizes of fish present. If you are the primary angler then it takes lots of time.
At a HOA meeting, tell them what you are doing and you would like written data for whenever they fish so you can better evaluate the lake for them. The more help you get the better the results. Some of the best data can come from kids bobber fishing with worms and live baits such as worms, crickets and grasshoppers. Encourage them to help you in the summer when they are off school. Maybe give them prizes or an angling trip with you for those with the most efforts. Spending a little money on kids prizes saves you time and provides good data.
For the smallest fish use some baited fish traps. A good place to fish them is near some cover. Then use some of the small trapped fish as bait for sampling larger fish.
One of the important things you should be doing is to be taking weekly secchi disk readings. Build your own secchi disk.
http://www.secchidipin.org/?s=secchi+diskhttp://rmbel.info/how-to-use-a-secchi-disk/ This data will help calculate the productivity of the lake. The productivity knowledge helps evaluate how many fish are in the lake as far as natural carrying capacity. This in turn allows one to estimate how many bass or fish to remove/harvest per acre.
The secchi disk depth provides a low "tech" method for assessing the clarity and relative productivity of a lake. Productivity determines the carrying capacity and a rough estimate of allowable harvest of a pond/lake.
Clarity is affected by phytoplankton, zooplankton, soil particles, bacteria, and other organic detrital materials suspended in the water. However, Secchi disk depth is primarily used as an indicator of algal abundance and general lake productivity. Although it is only an indicator, Secchi disk depth is the simplest and one of the most effective tools for estimating a lake's productivity.
Read and learn about pond/lake carrying capacity.
http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=92440#Post92440
