Another pond project

[FF117]

Thats a nice view from your porch.....2.5 acres, wow. We live in Quincy, about 3 hours west of Rantoul. Thanks for pointing out about the wind, I hadn't even thought of it. It's crazy that your beach washed away in a day, bummer. Maybe the south side is best for our pond because we usually get north winds in the winter when the pond will be frozen, plus there are trees to the north that may deflect some of the wind. I don't know, maybe we don't need a beach, just thought it would be nice. Guess I can always put that money toward a bigger pond.

I don't know the first thing about soils, but if you get under the topsoil, it's pretty much clay. According to the county's website much of our property is "Bunkum" and "Wakeland", but I have no idea what those are, even after a google search. I do have to haul in sand, so I don't like to idea of just losing it in the pond.

 

[piller]

Advice so far seems to suggest bigger is better as far as ponds go. I'll suggest however that you consider a pond size that is appropriate for the site and for you.
Several posts mentioned problems with erosion and wind on larger exposed ponds.

I've got two ponds on my farm. One pond we call our wildlife pond. It's spring fed and about 1/3 acre in size. The pond is hidden, we have sloping land that goes down to it from open pastures on either side and there are trees all around the pond. We get some good winds on the pastures but the pond is very quiet, private, and protected. We sit down there and listen to the water falling over rocks as it exits the pond and goes down stream through a grove of hemlocks. We have flying squirrels, deer, herons, wild ducks, all kinds of colorful salamanders, frogs, turkeys, etc.

If I wanted to I could easily build up the height of the dam so that the pond was no longer hidden and increase the pond size to about 3 or 4 acres. We like the pond just as it is. I've considered perhaps adding another small pond downstream and/or upstream, to create a series of smaller ponds.

We have another spring fed pond that is a little over an acre in size, in the middle of a pasture, exposed, with no trees. It's a good source of water and has nice views but we don't spend much time there. I think this pond needs some trees around it.

Just something to consider.

 

[FF117]

piller,

Thanks for the advice. I definitely plan on planting trees after the pond fills and we hope to get the wildlife viewing opportunities that you describe. I've been worried about erosion since it was mentioned here, especially with all the open field to the south.

Well, things have been moving fast. They got the equipment moved yesterday and got a lot of work done. The dirt has been working good and things have been going smoothly. Unfortunately though, my estimation of a one acre pond was optimistic. Based on the grade it only made sense to put the levee in one place. We tried to maximize the water surface area while still allowing the back side of the levee to be mowed easily. All I have now are cell phone pics, but I'm going back out tomorrow and will take some with the real camera. Good news is, it looks like it will be under budget so I can have the beach built and maybe get some other work done. They might be done by the weekend, which is good because we may get some precipitation on Saturday.

The equipment they are using looks pretty nice. They have a Komatsu D65px and a Komatsu PC300LC excavator.

 

[FF117]

Went out to inspect the work today. The levee is almost done, but there is still a lot of finish work to do around the edges and the back side of the levee. The original plan was to install a pipe for overflow, but with the limited amount of drainage to the site we decided to just put in an overflow spillway on the north side. It will be wide and is in a place thats already covered with vegetation. Not installing the pipe was at the suggestion of the contractor. This caught me by surprise because he would be making more money by installing the pipe. The edges of the pond will have a steep initial drop (to keep out the cattails) and a ledge around the outside. The edges still need to be worked so that I can mow up to the water. It's still a little hard for me to visualize.

Total depth will be about 15-16 feet. This is deeper than I wanted, but the topography dictated the depth. Beach will be on the south with the bottom contoured to hold the sand in place.

 

[ryer]

FF117,
Looking good, you are really going to have a nice pond there but also that's some very good looking soil you have to work with there. I take it that is your daughter? Is she smiling because daddy has made a big hole in the ground or you told her she could drive that big dozer, or maybe she knows something we don't. Keep up the good work.

Ryer

 

[jinman]

It looks like your plans are going nicely and great progress is being made. The fellow obviously knows what he is doing with the equipment. When your daughter is grown, you'll have that picture to show her and bring a smile to her face.:thumbsup:

 

[EddieWalker]

Great pictures and a beautiful lookin dam!!!! Nothing like pushing dirt around into something that will become permanent and totally change the land for all eternity.

Congratulations,
Eddie

 

[FF117]

Good news: The dam is complete and they spread top soil on the back side tonight. They made a nice shelf as wide as the dozer all the way down the south side. This will serve partially as the beach and the rest will be fish habitat.

Bad news: They hit sand yesterday...a lot of sand. They spent a lot of time digging it out and backfilling with clay. He said that they dug out enough sand that they could have put the dozer inside the hole. Needless to say, I don't think we're still under budget, even without the overflow pipe. Also, the back side of the dam ended up steeper than we wanted. I'll probably have to mow up and down instead of side to side. Although if I had a small lawnmower it would probably be OK. He apologized repeatedly for this, but explained that it would take a few more days to push enough dirt to make a noticeable difference in the grade. It's not a perfect world.

The dam has gotten pretty large and the pond pretty deep. I'm guessing close to 20 feet. This is good and bad. Bad because it makes a lot of useless water and will take a long time to fill. Good because if we have a drought there will be plenty of water and we can put geothermal lines from our future house on the bottom. There's still some grade work to do around the edges and they have to finish up on an old pond site that I'm having them clear. Assuming no problems, should be done tomorrow. That's good because it is getting dang cold and the ground will be frozen soon. Sorry for the long post.