John, I went through that type of drought last year at my place. This year lots of water. Every year is different at my place. Hope u get some much needed rain.
Frank, I don't know about what size TFS survives our winters. My seining in early June shows different sizes of TFS in the net. inch and a half to 5 or 6" sizes. They seem to spawn often at the pond. Yesterday afternoon I was at one of the feeders when I saw a school of TFS about a foot or so under the surface and they looked to be in the 3 to 4" range. The say they do not eat fish food but I always see TFS around the feeders at feeding times. I don't see them eat it but why else would they be there when the feeders go off? I figured they might be eating the feeder dust that gets thrown out when the feeder goes off. Hay! I am no expert that for sure.
Frank, what are your Tp doing? you still seeing them? I have not seen any since a month ago when I saw some 3" ones sunning in some shallows. Concerned my Tp may have been food for the lmb at stocking time since they were in the 6" size at the time I stocked them. I think some made it but I may need to stock the harder to find larger size when stocking next year. My water temps were 58 yesterday at 1 to 4'
Tracy, haven't seen TP since early October electroshocking, but that doesn't mean much. I rarely observe them around feeders and almost never catch any. Hope they haven't all died of cold yet, or at least got eaten by LMB.
I don't have the numbers of big LMB you do, so 6" size TP would probably survive longer in my BOW. Still, bigger would be better for reproduction.
Seems that bigger fish in general can take cold better than smaller fish of same species, which is why I asked about TFS survival from last year's cold winter. You and I both have BOW with good depth, which helps.
My water is less fertile than yours, which is one reason I haven't stocked TFS. Will have to up my game in this regard!
