Hi all, I am new to the site. I live in Florida but have 18 acres in NC that has a 1 and 1/2 acre pond on the property. It is stream fed with snow melt and the stream dries up in the early summer. The pond has a 4.5 foot average depth with the deepest part being about 6 feet near the spillway.

I fished the pond for the first time in early July, I bought the property in Nov. of 2013. It had been for sale for quite some time and likely was not managed for a long time. To my surprise in about 4 hrs worth of fishing throughout the weekend, I caught 22 bass. Only one fish was smaller than 12" and the largest was over 18". I decided on the final day to drown some night crawlers for bluegill. Again to my surprise, I caught about 10 gills that were larger than my hand and only one smaller one.

My thinking is that this pond has a very good "trophy balance" going on. The thing about catching the gills was that I really had to work for them. They were not schooled up and I picked one here and one there never more than one in a spot. I'd like to increase the population density but I certainly don't want to mess up the balance. I noticed two spots in the pond that had a cluster of about a dozen gill nests, there are obviously some fish there. I also caught a solitary crappie that was of decent size. I don't think that there are many of them though. I have no prior knowledge of what was stocked in the pond. Primary cover is lily pads and some tall grass. Any suggestions on what I should do to manage this pond? I am contemplating making the pond a bit larger in size. But again, I don't want to screw it up.