Hello, I am in Eastern South Carolina and just bought a home with a 1/2-3/4 acre stocked pond. This is my first time owning a stocked pond and I am trying to learn as much as I can. I know that there are some small-medium size bass in it as I saw them as I was walking the shoreline and saw a few smashing as they ate mosquitos/bugs on the water surface. I was told by a neighbor that it also has bream, shell cracker, and catfish in it. When I talked to the owner, he said it has crappie and bream in it. But, I don't think remembers everything that he put in it and hasn't really fished it. So, while I know that there is fish in it, I am just trying to figure out what to do next. I would really like to manage it for large bass as well as have a healthy population of copper nose bluegill and shellcracker. Since this is my first time owning a pond, I'm all excited and immediately think about going to get more fish and stocking it some more. But, I'm assuming that probably isn't the best strategy to start with.
That said, if you get a new pond that has some fish in it already, how do you go about evaluating it for current size/population to determine when/if you need to stock it more and with what fish type? Any help/recommendations would be appreciated.
Here is a picture. It's not a huge pond, but it is about 15-16 feet deep on one side and about 6-8 on the other.
