Here is a picture of my new pond. It was dug a few weeks ago. It is a quarter acre in size, 10 feet deep or a little more. It gets a lot of ground water coming in, unsure if it's water table level or run off.
Its only wet in some areas so I assume its run off and a lot of it.I think it is what is eroding the rear wall. The rear wall/base sucked my legs down into my thighs today. It was like quicksand, I assume because of the very clay like soil. There is a lot of water sitting there but also losing water I assume from cracks in base and not the eroding wall.
The back burm is roughly 20 ft wide and just as deep if not deeper than the pond.Thoughts? Ask any questions you may have. Pics attached.
Your soft bottom material (like quicksand) is probably either not well compacted clay or loose sediment from erosion of the banks. It the contractor did not use good compaction equipment just a bull dozer is a very poor soil compaction device.
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He only used a dozer to compact yes, the wall is also literally pushing out in spots where it's wet. So erosion is because of poor compaction? What could I do on my own to fix the problem?
It looks like the yellow clay we have here. If so, they never compact it when they dig a pond around here. We get a little sloughing off here or there but it is nothing major and stops after the pond gets full. It will soak up some water as it fills until the dirt around the pond gets saturated. My dam is about 25 feet wide on top and was made with only a dozer and never has leaked. It's good dirt for pond building. I've only seen one leaking pond on yellow clay here in my life and that was due to trees growing on the dam.
If it was my pond, I'd bring equipment back in and have the pond compacted.
I've never heard of a problem pond that had too much compaction, only problem ponds where there wasn't enough compaction, or soils that weren't the correct type to be compacted (sand).
It looks to me like the "wet" area is where a natural drainage ditch was filled in. If that is the case, runoff is following the original ditch/creek bottom and entering the pond.
I think that's what it is. A water shed of sorts.A lot of water is coming in and blowing it out. Should I let the water move what it wants and let it settle on its own?
