Found an old pond - needs water

jk96 · Jan 24, 2009

Well I made it out today for a few hours and finished clearing the silted area. Just need to do some cleanup around the banks and on the dam now. I'll try to finish that next week and then probably won't do much else until the frost is out of the ground. Now that the areas cleaned up a little better, I can see that getting water into the pond should not be a problem. The biggest obstacle will be preventing it from silting back in.

Pond surface cleared with the exception of some stumps.

A view down the dam

Looks like the trees growing on the pond surface are all 10+ years old so its been silted in for quite some time.

IXLR8 · Jan 24, 2009

Interesting.... keep us posted on how things are going.

jk96 · Feb 11, 2009

Still need to do a little more cleanup but almost there. I did get out today with the tractor. The last several days have been pretty warm here and decided to try to do a little digging in a test area to see what type of soil I got into. The initial results look promising. I dug a test hole with the FEL and after breaking through the frost line I only dug to about 2 feet before getting into what looks like pretty good clay soil. Not a soil expert but tried the ball test with moist soil and it held firm and did not crumble and was also able to easily mold a cup out of the soil.

Soil before adding water

Ball test

cup test - complete with water

ZetorShaun · Feb 11, 2009

Those pictures are classic, you are the man, really liked the cup.

Anyway, I enjoyed this blog on pond building:
The Pond Blog: The Pond Planning Stage

It seems like a small pond but just for fun you could get the aerial photos of your land and see if there were others. If an old timer built one he may have built more. I got the ones of my farm from 54', 66', 72' and a bunch more in the 80s and 90s from the USGS, they were like 13 bucks each, well worth it: http://www.usgs.gov/pubprod/

Looks like it was a good little pond once, don't you wish you could spend one afternoon walking your land as it was 50 or 100 years ago? I could finally look at my coal mine, spring house, and my oak trees as they were back in the day.

Keep up the good work.

Cap-n-Cray · Feb 11, 2009

An aerial photo would be great. Try This site. It has some good detailed views sometimes. Once you find your area try the birds eye view. Sometimes better than Google Earth.

Cary

jk96 · Feb 11, 2009

An aerial photo would be great. Try This site. It has some good detailed views sometimes. Once you find your area try the birds eye view. Sometimes better than Google Earth.

Thanks for the link. I've been using google earth but had never tried maps live before. The photos of the land were pretty old however my house was within a couple of years. The clarity of the pictures were pretty amazing.

Here's a couple of aerials of the land and pond location using google earth

I also took fishmans advise and contacted our local MDC. They were very helpful and offered to come out this spring and take a look at the pond to provide advise and suggestions. They also put together a proposed site for a larger pond. They suggested a two acre pond and estimated 18 acres of watershed. Here's a picture of the proposed site from MDC. Just wish I could afford to do it right now.

deputyrpa · Feb 11, 2009

Those aerials identify some key locations for deer stands! Some food plots and a water source are going to turn your beautiful property into a wildlife mannet. Any chance the MDC could help design a larger pond that has some exposure into the field? Waterfowl would enjoy that feature!

jk96 · Feb 11, 2009

Those aerials identify some key locations for deer stands! Some food plots and a water source are going to turn your beautiful property into a wildlife mannet.

I'm open for suggestions. Especially on food plots. Location, type, size?

The field was in corn last year and I'm sure it will probably be planted in soybeans this year. I haven't talked to the guy who farms it yet. This year was the first year I really put in much stand time on the property so I'm just now starting to get a feel for the deer movement. Still got a lot to learn. I did shoot a nice buck during gun season. He was walking into the corn close to one of the funnels.

As for the larger pond proposed by MDC I don't have the resources to do it at this time, but even if I did I don't think the pond could be constructed into any of the field edges. The property slopes pretty heavy from the field toward the proposed site. However on the west side of the proposed pond this area is all tall grass with a few locust and hedge mixed in. It could easily be opened up a little more.

jk96 · Jun 5, 2009

We'll its been awhile since I updated. Time got away from me and the project got put on the backburner. I wen't back up to the property last week and the small test hole I dug was full of water with lots of wildlife tracks.

This week I had a heavy equipment operator work on a project for my business. After talking to him about the old pond, he dropped by today to take a look at it and see about cleaning it out. We visited the site and he is planning on coming up this week to get it done. I'll post some updated pics once he starts.

jayste · Jun 5, 2009

jk96 said:
We'll its been awhile since I updated. Time got away from me and the project got put on the backburner. I wen't back up to the property last week and the small test hole I dug was full of water with lots of wildlife tracks.

This week I had a heavy equipment operator work on a project for my business. After talking to him about the old pond, he dropped by today to take a look at it and see about cleaning it out. We visited the site and he is planning on coming up this week to get it done. I'll post some updated pics once he starts.

Looking forward to it! Nothing like watching a good operator do their thing! Good looking spot as well. Is the clearing or meadow used for hay or crops? Again, looking forward to the "heavy machinery" pics.

Jay

jk96 · Dec 1, 2009

Well I had almost given up on the pond and got a surprise today. Got a phone call and found out the pond was done. The operator was a no-show after several calls this summer and I had placed it on the backburner until next spring.

Unfortutely since I didn't know he was working on it I wasn't there to take pictures. The only pictures I got were a few from my trail camera. The project only took him about 6 hours to clean it out. Looks like some pretty heavy clay throughout and should hold well. Time will tell.

Only took one photo from my phone of the finished project. I'll try to take some better pictures this weekend.

EddieWalker · Dec 2, 2009

Good thing for the game camera!!!!

Congrats, now the fun begins. There's nothing that compares to seeing it fill up and overflow for the first time.

Eddie

jinman · Dec 2, 2009

EddieWalker said:
There's nothing that compares to seeing it fill up and overflow for the first time.

Eddie, that's so true. However, there are two ponds close to me that were so poorly planned and placed that they rarely have as much water in them as my toilet.

Unlike the movie title, just because you build it is no guarantee that the water will come. I'm sure that's not the case of jk96's pond and I'm looking forward to seeing some filled pictures.

jk96 · Dec 2, 2009

I'm sure that's not the case of jk96's pond and I'm looking forward to seeing some filled pictures.

I hope your right Jim. All of the topos show water there at some time in the past. The soil looks good so I'm hoping there enough runoff to fill it. I've been cussing all the rain we've had lately and now I can't wait for more.

Any suggestions on what type of vegatation to plant both on the spillway and around the pond for erosion control?

Jeremy

jinman · Dec 2, 2009

jk96 said:
Any suggestions on what type of vegatation to plant both on the spillway and around the pond for erosion control?

Jeremy

I think this time of year you would do well to plant some rye grass for quick germination. If it were springtime, I'd say wheat, but I don't know if it would germinate in cooler temperatures. Rye grass can germinate in the range of 50 to 70 degrees F if it is kept moist and in contact with the soil. For your application, some lawngrass seed with a fescue or Kentucky bluegrass mix might be best. You will also get the best results if you drag a section of weighted chainlink fence over the seed so they are covered by up to 1/4" of soil. What you don't want is to leave the seed spread all over the top of your soil so they wash into the bottom of your pond at the first heavy rain. Also, migrating birds can eat a lot of your seeds if they discover them.

jk96 · Dec 2, 2009

Thanks Jim,

I'm in NW MO so the temp here today is already mid 30's. I may have to wait until early spring.

jk96 · Dec 2, 2009

Took a little better picture today. Went back out to place the trail camera on the pond. I figured it may make some interesting pictures in the future to document the progress as it fills along with some of the wildlife that uses it.

jk96 · Mar 11, 2010

First signs of water.

We recieved .45 inches of rain last week and the first signs of water appeared.

Another .3 inches of rain yesterday.

EddieWalker · Mar 11, 2010

I'm suprised you haven't received more rain. We're getting rain here on a weekly basis. My ground is so saturated that the water is just oozing out of it and my ponds are bot full and overflowing.

Are you going to put any structure in there for the fish? Something to hide in?

Eddie

jk96 · Mar 11, 2010

We've had quite a bit of snow over the winter, last storm was 8 inches, but the melt off was so slow that we really didn't get any runoff from it. The last two rains were the first significant rainfall we've had. The rain was more of a soaker and not a downpoor but it's nice to see a little water there anyway.