Building a pond questions

[TORQUIN]

Gee, what luck seeing this thread. I am building my own pond now. It will be small and diamond shaped, perhaps 120' across th elongest 2 points. And doggone it, I'm not in a hurry, so it will be built with my L3830, I think.
I'll let you know if I ever get discouraged. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

I will be checking out the links you guys have supplied.. I'm sure they will be helpful.


Chris

 

[have_blue]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( Gee, what luck seeing this thread. I am building my own pond now. Chris )</font>

You will find the digging is easy. A small disk harrow quickly and easily loosens up the dirt, and the FEL quickly moves. The hard part is transporting the dirt any distance away from the pond.

Good luck. You'll need it. /forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif

 

[armyret]

I have been reading all the posts, and I am sure glad that I do not have to contend with all the aforemention problems. I have a 1 1/2 acre pond built with a tractor and front end loader and scraper blade. Was there mistakes, yes, can they be tolortated yes. I had a natural wet low lying area with good drainage to keep it full. In fact I could just as easy construct another one below the current one of same size or bigger. Mistakes on this pond is that the edges are not deep enough therefore causing weed growth. One straight 7 inch overflow pipe and one with a 90 on it a little lower than the 7 incher. Emergency spill way works great. Problem is I keep losing fish through both drainage pipes. When pond gets high the suction pressure is enormous. tried everything and nothing works great. Now have covered both with clay
pots and holes in them, but does not let enough water through and they keep becomming cloged. Ideas accepted. I do have a shaded side and weeds not so bad there. I started reading this post for I need to build a pond rake that will work off of my boom pole attached to tractor do not need to clean weeds no more that 6 to 8 feet from bank. I really need a back hoe and deepen the edges. Enviormental tells me that depth is the key to elimitaing weeds.
Hope this did not bore anyone.

 

[TORQUIN]

I'm thinking you need a screen on your pipes so you can keep your fish. You'd have to make it out of expanded metal, and at least 50% larger than your pipes, to give it the extra surface area to withstand clogging. You'd probably want ti 12-14" deep, and necked down to the diameter of the pipe.
I'd go with the largest holes I could stand, in the metal, so you might lose minnows and smaller fish, but it would be less likely to clog. And if they do clog, that's OK, it will wait until you unclog it, if your spillway works correctly.

Please know that I have absolutely no pond digging or draining experience, I'm just talking from common sense and remembering what I have seen in other places in the past.

Chris

 

[PineRidge]

Armyret a company called Agri Drain makes a product called a bar guard that will serve your purpose well. I have one installed on the overflow pipe of my pond and it has yet to plug. It also keeps my fish in the pond where they belong. Call them toll free at 1-800-232-4742

 

[txdon]

I have an 8" drainpipe. On the end in the pond is a capped 5' piece of 8" pipe with about 300-500 - 1/2" drilled holes in the pipe. Works great.

 

[have_blue]

Hi armyret,

Just to give you some ideas, here's how I'm planning my pond.

My pond has a 2 foot tall, 12 foot wide levee around it. It's already covered with bermudagrass, which looks pretty and prevents erosion. Maximum water level will be 24" below the tops of the levee (ground level). My 10 acres are landscaped so that all runoff water is directed into the pond. The water will enter the pond at 1 choke point, which is a large limestone gravel filter bed. The water will percolate through the coarse gravel, run beneath the levee, and up into the pond. The filter bed is big enough so that partial stoppage won't stop the flow significantly.

If the pond level rises, the water will back up through the filter, and no fish can escape.

There is no need for an emergency spillway. Excessive water will simply run off without going into the pond. I would have to get a 1000 year flood to rise above the levee. If that happens, the pond would be the least of my worries.

Mistakes? Well... maybe my levees are a bit higher than necessary, but were a good place to dispose of the rich topsoil I have dug out. The levees are still settling, and I suspect will wind up at only 18" high or less

armyret, how many yards of soil did you remove from your pond? I need to move nearly 20,000 yards, and that's way too much for my tractor and FEL!

 

[armyret]

Hi Have Blue:

I do wish that I could respond factually but cannot. I have no idea how much dirt was removed. My pond location was perfect. It was sloped on both sides and was sort of a swamp area.or at least a wet area/\. All that was needed was to construct a earthern dam acrose the end and instal drainage and emergency overflow. It could have been constructed deeper. Only 9 to 10 feet at the dam. 5 at the shallow end.
I am so fortunate that my pond never gets muddy, I presume that the fields and forest on one side filters it good. The soil just does not lend itself to muddy water. The bigest mistake was the drainage pipes. Someone just posted something that I will try and that is to entend the pipe further out in the pond with 4 or 500 1/2 inch holes in it and cap the end to prevent fish loss. I will try to post a photo when I learn how. In my opinion My pond is inpressive. The bigest problem is gueese.
They like it and they can make a mess. Good luck

 

[have_blue]

armyret:

What's important for your filter is area. If your overflow pipe is say 8", the filter should be quite a bit bigger. You could "T" into it with a long piece of larger pipe with the ends plugged, an drill your holes. Another way would be a stainless or aluminum frame "cage", wrapped with stainless or at least galvanized hardware cloth. If it's big enough, it will never completely stop up.

Best,,,

 

[PHSteph]

I have a pond in the Catskills that was dredged about 50 years ago. It does not have any of the fancy things you guys have been talking about (fountains, filters, liners, overflow pipes, or emergency overflows), but it is beautiful. It is in the side of a hill and has an earth dam on the other side. Unfortunately, it leaks (probably because of muskrats, which are fun to watch, but I just learned from the string that they can make holes in your levee. The levee is also washed out on one side, down to bedrock, so it is not as deep as it used to be. Any suggestions about how I could plug the hole and build the dam back up? Can I do this while there is water in the pond? (I'm not going to attempt this myself--I'm looking for somebody with a back hoe.)
Steph