On 9 acres our bass are starting to tail off in their growth rate. Plenty of bass in the 3-4 lb range and many smaller fish as well, lots of bluegill with no stunting and a population of about 20-30 large channel cats. I'm also going to introduce black crappie. So I'm wondering if I should start taking some of the smaller bass out along with some gills. We've been pretty strict about catch and release with the bass and only occasionally fry up some gill. Anyone have any advice?

If you're serious about raising BIG largemouth I think you should consider a mandatory slot harvest. An example would be to harvest all LMB between 11-15 inches, in particular individuals with less than fabulous body condition. These intermediate sized inidviduals often eat smaller LMB, so you shouldn't have problems with future recruitment.

BTW, you probably don't see a bluegill "stunting" problem because of the heavy pressure that a high density LMB population will put on young of the year BG. If you put heavy pressure on intermediate LMB then you will likely see more small BG. This can be a good thing for encouraging good growth rates on LMB.

I agree with Bruce. Put in place a slot limit. But how are the relative weights to length? Are they healthy? I would not go the Crappie route if you want LMB. Puts more strain on your LMB forage.

Good luck.

They're chunky dudes. I'm just seeing many more bass in the 5-12 inch range than I'm used to.

I have a similar problem but I am seeing mostly 12" - 15" lmb and not many big ( 3 lb + ) ones, maybe one in 15. My bluegill also seem to be on the small side. What type of harvest strategy should I use to increase the size of both.

How big is your pond Scott?

My pond is about 2acres, 10 - 12 feet at the deepest point.