Hey CJ,
Your right on. We have chain pickerel down here and and your right they get about 24 inches or so, and would work great for keeping down your smaller bass/fish, but the question is once your smaller bass/fish are gone then you have 24 inch pickerel and your bass competing to eat the same food!! Then what? Better have a a whole lot of food!! I didn't quite get it before when I read a post on here about only having 1 predator fish in your pond but I am begining to understand now why that's a good rule to follow! Course in a 5 acre pond I suppose you could get by with 2 types of pedator fish if you know what you were doing!