James, thats a good question, seems like Overton had a post here one time putting up a huge number of fish per acre that he grew on his farm. don't quote me but it was something like he started with 20-lbs or brooders and ended up with eihter 2000 or 5000lbs of fish at the end of the year.
Although in a pond with predators, BG and bass, i don't see how tilapia could even get close to that number simply because the majority of the young are eaten when they are less than an inch long. I witnessed this over and over again. BG were the biggest consumer of young tilapia. As soon as the female spit them out it was murder. Pretty fun to watch though.
As far as the original question was concerned, I think the Tilapia was a great idea to help get my BG population up and thriving again. But now it seems that if I can feed all different sizes of pellets throughout the year next year, that might be the best bang for the buck as far as pound for pound.
Now as for the 7 acre pond, I believe Tilapia will benefit it to a higher degree simply due to fertilization. I have 1.5 acres of water dedicated to growing my florida bass which was stocked with 20lbs tilapia per acre, minnows, cnbg, and fertilized. I can easily say the tilapia produced many times more than they did in the unfertilized 4 acre lake.
