Brad there are at least a couple of examples where the populations seem to thrive without stocking.

One is Texoma where smallies haven't been stocked since 1987, yet you can find them from the dam all the way west to the buncombe creek area, and north as far as Hwy 70 (kingston/durant, ok), and as previously noted, good quality, 3-4 lbers are not at all uncommon and every now and then you'll get into a 5-6lb class fish.

The other one is amistad, which hasn't been stocked since 1983, so obviously the fish there either reproduce well or it gets continuously restocked from the devils river / rio grande. But i don't have any idea about the quality of smallies there, i have never fished it and haven't heard of big ones being caught there, but i have heard the numbers are good in certain areas.

They stocked over 300,000 trout that are hauled in from Arkansas, do the same for SMB.

As far as Amistad, Lake record is 5.37, all of mine have been under 2 1/2 lbs. Few weeks ago I caught one in 2 ft of water on a swimjig mainlake.

Only not a fan in some sectors, largemouth bass management one of them. Too much politics, not enough biology.

Trout are cheap, bass, especially smallmouths, are not. Besides, the trout come from Missouri, not Arkansas.

Belton is starting to show some big brown toads and we have had a couple 4's and a bunch of 3's at canyon. It you don't get happy hooking those I don't know what else to say.