Anyone know how to drag a pond?

[rvtech]

My shallow pond needs cleaned. It has a lot of leaves and algae on the bottom. I don't want to drain it because of fish, turtles and frogs. I was thinking maybe I could drag the bottom with a harrow of some sort towing it across from one side with the tractor. The pond is 40' x 65' and about 5' deep. We recently installed a fountain, but it keeps clogging with algae. We plan to put dye in to help contain the algae too. From what I read it seems we need to get the leaves out. Any ideas are appreciated.

[Renze]

In Holland, they clean city waterways with small boats, they have a rake up front to "shovel out" the vegetation that was cut loose with the sickle mowers and dumped on heaps on the shoreline.
To remove any water plants that grow from the bottom, they use a net which is drawn through the water on a reciprocating hook. The reciprocating of the hook allows the net to sink back to the bottom of the waterway inbetween the intermittent forward pulling motion.

Concrete rebar net might work, with chains attached to 4 corners, and another line to pull it back and keep it upright. ?? If the pond is not too big, and your time is not too scarce, it might be worth a try.

The other, more common method in agricultural areas where there is space to drive machinery next to the waterway is this: Herder producten

[MarkV]

Ask over at www.pondboss.com in the forum section “Ask the Boss”. Good people over there with a lot of knowledge. I don’t hear of many dragging a pond but there are some chemical treatments or grass carp to help control vegetation.

MarkV

[ns_in_tex]

Originally Posted by rvtech

My shallow pond needs cleaned. It has a lot of leaves and algae on the bottom. The pond is 40' x 65' and about 5' deep. We recently installed a fountain, but it keeps clogging with algae. From what I read it seems we need to get the leaves out. Any ideas are appreciated.

We built what looks like a giant garden rake, with the teeth made out of 2" pipe, maybe 15" long and the rake is maybe 6' wide. We made it so it would connect to the ends of the forks on our front end loader, in such a fashion that extensions could be put on. With 5' extensions, it will reach 17' in front of the tractor front wheels. It works great for cleaning out the creek beds or the edges of the pond. We also have wired flat plate to the front side so we could drag sludge out of the bottom. We just drag it up on the bank, then use a grapple to move it away. We hope to make some 10' extensions to gain a little more reach in the future.

[lhfarm]

Originally Posted by ns_in_tex

We built what looks like a giant garden rake, with the teeth made out of 2" pipe, maybe 15" long and the rake is maybe 6' wide. We made it so it would connect to the ends of the forks on our front end loader, in such a fashion that extensions could be put on. With 5' extensions, it will reach 17' in front of the tractor front wheels. It works great for cleaning out the creek beds or the edges of the pond. We also have wired flat plate to the front side so we could drag sludge out of the bottom. We just drag it up on the bank, then use a grapple to move it away. We hope to make some 10' extensions to gain a little more reach in the future.

Any pictures? I'm having a hard time visualizing how it mounts to the forks.

Thanks,

[ns_in_tex]

Originally Posted by lhfarm

Any pictures? I'm having a hard time visualizing how it mounts to the forks.

Thanks,

We hope to be using it in the near future. I will try to remember to take some pictures.

[rvtech]

Thanks for the pondboss link. There is a ton of info there. I'm going to try some of their suggestions. There are many with similar problems.

[George2615]

You could always ask the police department. I hear they know how to drag a body (pun intended) of water looking for bodies.

[Lazy]

Hi
How far do you need to drag the pond?

[rvtech]

It measures 140' x 180'. We added dye yesterday. I was told by several people that dye will stop sun penetration and quickly kill the "coontails" growing from the bottom.
We spent an entire day trying a variety of ways to drag the bottom. We learned that there is far more to remove than we could ever do. We covered several acres of a field with what we removed and barely cleared one small corner of the pond. It's a huge project. Hopefully the dye will work.