masterbasser, get the July/August 2004 issue of Pond Boss for an article about our lake. With your primary goal being big LMB, a simple system focusing all of the forage into your LMB would probably work best. You will sacrifice some LMB for high diversity.
My goal is lots of fair sized fish with very high diversity. Here's what we have: LMB, SMB, HSB, white bass, rock bass, bluegill, HBG, pumpkinseeds, green sunfish, white crappie, black crappie, walleye, sauger, yellow perch, CC, freshwater drum, goldeye, shorthead redhorse, white sucker and sterile grass carp. The only species that reproduces in any amount are bluegill. This lake is very predator heavy.
We feed Aquamax 600 pellets and anything that eats them does very well. This includes the LMB, SMB, HSB, CC, rock bass, bluegill, HBG and goldeyes. I'm assuming that any pellets that sink are eaten by the white suckers and shorthead redhorse.
The green sunfish and yellow perch have almost been eleminated by the LMB. There just isn't enough open water forage for white bass. The crappie, walleye and sauger do well when the water is cool but are not competitive for forage when the water is warm and get very thin.
Our lake is completely catch and release and except for the bluegill, I must continually restock everything. Hopefully, this will give you some ideas.
