Actually, what you say makes a lot of sense.
Frequently, the state wildlife agencies have a pond guideline for their state that says something to the effect of: "Don't stock crappie in bodies of water less than 5 acres."
However, if the pond is SMALL enough, then the population could be theoretically controlled by angling and/or supplemental trapping.
I think that would be difficult/impossible for a 3-acre pond, but much more feasible for a 1/4-1/3 acre pond.
I believe I have also read of people on Pond Boss that have good long-term crappie ponds that are larger than that size, but they have management help from their predators. (There were also replies in the thread of people with similar sized ponds failing on their crappie projects, so there are probably also some site-specific factors.)
gehajake,
What size is your crappie pond? What predators for crappie were present?
