Granted, Eric, limestone is great for fertility, hence the practice of liming; but I've never read anything about the Ketona Lakes being former phosphate pits, and I just re-read (twice) the article I linked to and there's no mention of such; I wouldn't think a limestone quarry could also be a phosphate pit. I read the article in Outdoor Life that's referenced in the article linked above when the former came out, and it didn't say anything about the lakes ever being phosphate pits.
The Ketona lakes would seem not to be overly fertile, because Coke McKenzie said that one could see the bottom in ten feet of water. That's not much of a plankton bloom. Some biologists from the state of AL did a study of the lake in an effort to determine what made the bluegill grow so large; they even transplanted some of the bluegill to other area lakes thinking that their genetics must be better; but they concluded it was the high bass density, and the absence of spawning areas, that accounted for the difference in size. They did allude to the positive effect of the limestone; they also mentioned that McKenzie's fish was nine years old, which is three years older than what they had previously believed a bluegill in the region could live to be. The longevity factor obviously will help Bruce, as you noted.
I agree that it should be very interesting to see how Bruce's elysium unfolds, to say the least. Isn't 8" a little above average for bluegill in that region that aren't being managed, Bruce? I think I'd have a very hard time not managing that sweet of a BOW if I owned it.
No shallow water not only limits bluegill spawning - and fewer bluegill fry means the overcrowded bass can thin them more drastically than if there were many, as is normal - but it also means there's no refuge for the fry and mid-sized bluegill alike to escape predation, no small factor in itself.
