Now…my project.

My land tract is just under 300 acres. I call it "Elizabeth" (named after my wife - gotta score some brownie points with momma). I know to you boys in Texas and the Midwest this sounds small, but for my area this is a pretty good sized tract...it is hilly terrain with elevations ranging from 250-480ft. About half of the property is in hardwood/pine mix and we manage extensively for wildlife and plant about 50 acres just for the deer and turkeys…we do trophy management along with the adjoing tracts that total about 2000 acres and basically I save the bucks on my place for guests... (I have only shot one deer with horns off this property and it was because I had my son with me and he needed to see a successful hunt to get hooked so I took a mature 7pt). I lease another 100 acres behind me to provide a buffer for hunting and bedding area….I never even go on this land and it just grows trees for a timber company

Enough about the land….lets talk water.

Let’s just start by saying that I ran into problems with my original site for the “stair step” ponds.

Not one to give up easily, I identified a few other sites and finally found a few that I could make work.

The problem with these sites is water flow...no biggie I have a creek nearby and I own a big 500gpm diesel pump...fill with the creek, sterilize, stock and then maintain water levels with a well. This is where I hit my next problem…filling with the creek is good, but the well plan did not work out (dug a few wells that were basically dry – just 2-4gpm). So, I’ll have to maintain water levels with the creek and that is causing me heartburn because of trash fish getting sucked into the ponds…so I’m trying to crack that one right now (comments welcome – I also made another post earlier about this problem).

I am not building the ponds myself. I have a good contractor with a great local reputation…I have researched enough to be dangerous, but I am pretty confident these guys know what they are doing….they don’t take shortcuts on the core or slope ratios…the only thing I questioned at first was that they use a big D5 to pack but they are constantly using the pans and dozer and I’ve looked at several dams they have built over the years and they all have held up great.

OK – so here is the status:

Pond #1 - 2.5 acres - is fully built and filled with water. I botched 2 things on this one. I didn’t replace topsoil on the hill beside the pond (where we pulled clay for the core) and I can’t get anything to grow – so every time it drizzles rain the pond goes muddy. We also didn’t want to risk the dock being under water once the pond filled so we tried to “error on the high side” and we built the docks too high. I think I did a good job with structure and the construction was solid (nice core trench and a good seal – only water loss seems to be evaporation). This pond was built at the back of the property during the winter to give me a chance to cut my teeth. I learned a lot about what I want and like and am now applying what I learned on the new pond. I’ll also go back and add some topsoil and fix the docs…so no killer problems yet.


Pond #2 - 2 acres– just finished the dam last week. This pond is AWESOME. Nice and deep with some great natural and man made contours. A great view down the pond from the ridge and this is where I will be building my cabin (hope to get that started in the next month or so once I get my septic permit – another long story). We did a “bowed” dam on this pond to add to aesthetic appeal. We got most of the core clay from the pond bottom and up on a hill behind the pond, so hopefully erosion will not be as bad here. We have already top-soiled, seeded and matted all exposed slopes to get it greened up before we fill it….will do better on the dock ;-)

Pond #3 – 2 acres – in process now. We have shot the lines and we’re just getting it rolling. Have a timber crew coming in Monday to get some saw timber in the pond basin and then we’ll get started. In the meantime the pond crew is putting in 2 duck ponds in the back of the property behind pond #1. We will plant corn and flood the duck ponds during duck season with water from the fish pond…should be an easy limit of wood ducks any morning we decide to hunt. This new pond will be the most unique shape wise and is in a more wooded setting.

Pond #4 – TBD – will be a small put and take CC only pond…not sure yet where I’m gonna put it.

I want to share my stocking and management strategy for these ponds and get some feedback but it is getting late and I’m meeting a friend at 5am to take him fishing (at the club pond). I’ll try to write some about the management plan later in the weekend. I plan to get started with the stockings as soon as the weather cools down for transport.

Good luck to anyone fishing this weekend...don’t catch ‘em all!!

If you do, throw the big ones back!!

"Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing that it is not the fish they are after." - Henry David Thoreau