My wife and I recently purchased 16 acres here in central Oklahoma. The idea is to build a pond, plant some trees, and make a nice place to build a house in the coming years. The land is pretty flat overall as it has been used for farmland for several years. Part of the land, as you'll see below is located in a floodplain.

I had the local NRCS out already to do some looking around. My original thought was that I wanted to build something pretty large, maybe around 3 acres. I thought a running windmill could help to keep it full. After talking to the NRCS, and doing some research online, Im not so sure. The NRCS recommended something around 1/2 acre. To me, that just doesn't seem like much or enough. I have an understanding of how much 3 acres is, as my house lot now is 1.5 acres, and my neighbors is also 1.5 acres. Thats where I came up with the 3 acre idea...

I started doing a little research yesterday, and according to one of the Oklahoma College's websites, we experience about 60" of evaporation per year. So for a 1 acre pond, that's about 1,629,250 gallons of evaporation per year...? Does that sound right? So for a 2 or 3 acre pond, that number could just be multiplied by the 2 or 3?

We do average around 30" of rain per year. Per 1 acre, that would be about 814,620 gallons. So I would still have a deficit of 814,620 not including any runoff that I might catch. On Aermotor's windmill website, they say their 8' model can pump approximately 190 gph in 15-20 mph winds. Our average wind speed is 12.3 mph. So multiplying the 190 gmp x 24 hours x 365 days x .5 the mph = 832,200. So that would seem to make up for the difference.

Am I looking way to deep into this? I'm probably like most people, and want the best/most, but I definitely dont want to end up with an empty hole or a mud pit...I figured it might be good to start construction in October or so to catch all the winter and spring precipitation before the summer.

Here are the pictures of the land and the layout.


This first one shows the outline of the land. The east/southeast border is a running creek, but the creek bed is about 30 below the rest of the land, else it could be a great source to fill with...



This is where to floodplain extends..


This is the topography map...


Sorry this is so long, but I wanted to include as many details as possible to get the best answers and ideas...

Welcome JxxxOxxxE.

I'm no soils guy, but we have some good ones here that should chime in soon. Stay tuned!

I will be patiently waiting. I have the Perfect Pond book already, and have been reading as much as possible.

JxxxOxxxE,

Hey Joe welcome,

The NRCS is giving you stats on what they belive will work with what little bit of land you have. I am sure someone else here can get a bit more accurate with this, but I belive for a 3 acre pond NRCS would like you have about 30 acres of watershed. A one acre pond should have a 8- to 12-acre watershed, or approximately three to five acres of drainage area for each acre-foot of water storage. Course this could change if you have a way to pump in water all the time when needed.

Hello JxxxOxxxE and welcome to Pond Boss. I'm certainly no expert so I'll leave the analysis to one of them. Congratulations on the purchase of your property! Hang on for some feedback.

YOu have given this much thought but
1. you need to determine watershed acres.
2. based on this determine based on rainfall the avg stated n the area nrcs should know this per watershed to surface acre.
3. I would use the pump to maybe offset evap but not depened on it as source of filling the pond.
$. Once you have doable acres define your goals based ont he acres you sustain for the pond.

Hey Joe,

Listen to Greg he knows his stuff!!
Here is something else you may want to keep in mind. Also keep in mind the information I am giving you here is general. Not written in stone. As Bill Cody says "It All Depends"

Excavated ponds may be preferred over embankment ponds in flat or gently sloping terrain and may not require an expensive dam. Floodplains should be not be selected as sites for either type of pond because the dam may be eroded by floods.

Well, I just got off the phone with the NRCS, and they said preliminary calculations show me to have about 40 acres of watershed there. Which would go with what RC51 said for a 2-3 acre. The NRCS guy said 1/2 acre again. I'm not sure what to think...




I figured since the land was so flat that I would end up with more of an excavation, rather than building a dam. There might be a small dam, but nothing big...

Do you know the type of soils that are found on your place?

Did he say why he come to that conclusion?

Here in Oklahoma we have alot of clay. He said from looking at the maps that the soil would probably be fine, but that they'd definitely test it first...



Well when I met with them earlier in the week we met at the site. When they said 1/2 acre then, I figured it was just from looking at the layout of the land, since they hadn't looked at the maps yet. I was surprised to hear the 40 acre watershed number today, but then was surprised again to hear a 1/2 acre again...He did say that it may be a little much for the 1/2 acre, but that it should be okay...I didnt throw in that I still wanted bigger...

Well you got me lost now?? That doesn't make sence to me? 40 acres of watershed is quite a bit. Maybe someone else could shed some light on it for you. Greg / ewest / Theo does that sound right? 40 acres of watershed for just a 1/2 acre pond? I have a 1 acre pond and I don't have near 40 acres of shed.

It depends on the avg rainfall.

I think I am going to call them back on monday and see what programs and data they are using to calculate it. He said it was all done on computer. He faxed me this sheet this afternoon...I dont know what any of it means...LoL...




Soil Types: Dale B ???? Does that mean anything to anyone?



As stated above, the average rainfall is approximately 30".

Yeah suppose that would be right. Who cares how much watershed you have if you don't have any rain for it!!! I am such a rookie. Joe we average about 45 inches a year here in Arkansas and my pond is just under 1 acre and it seems to keep it pretty well full except in the very heat of the summer. Course this year we got 81 inches of rain and it's been a mess!! 30 inches does seem a bit low for a 2 or 3 acre pond even though you do have the watershed for it. Try to find someone who can come and give you a 2nd or 3rd opinion and see what they say.

start here

Brettski, thanks for the link...

Hey Joe

Here in E NE we receive 29" of precipitation annually - and using that formula the NRCS stated it requires 33 acres of watershed to naturally sustain water levels for a 1 acre pond.

My watershed is just over 40 acres. I built a 4 acre pond. I irrigate to supplement precipitation. For me the cost of drilling a well was worth it as I plan to live there someday. Hope this is helpful.

Joe

40 acre watershed at 30" annual precip will definitely keep a 1/2 acre pond full, but I would wager you could go a little larger and supplement with your windmill or try a trash pump from the creek near your land if you have access to it.

Thanks for the replies...

teehjaeh57, do you irrigate with a windmill or an electric pump? If windmill, what brand and size? How many gpm or gph are you getting? Does it constantly run? If so, do you have a slight overflow? Do you know your average evaporation?

I definitely plan on drilling a well to supplement water. I plan to build a house here in 5 - 10 years, and then never move again. So a good investment doesnt worry me...

Im supposed to be going to look at a pond a local guy built somewhere in the 6+ acre range that he keeps full running a 5 horse well pump at 50 gpm...

Joe

I dug a 270' well - 5 HP Electric Goulds pump - had to govern it down to do under 50 GPM so I wasn't regulated by the state.

Evaporation is hard for me to estimate as last year I filled my ponds for the first time and I think I'm losing a lot of water to the soil. This Spring I figure soils should be saturated and I'm going to monitor very closely. I know I have one small pond with a leak - I want to be certain my other ponds are okay.

One thing I learned is bigger doesn't equate into better in terms of BOW size. A 1 acre or two 1/2 acre ponds allow you a great opportunity to diversify and experiment and still allow for trophy fish to grow. If you wanted to you could have a SMB, YP, RES and HSB pond on top - put in an agridrain - and the second pond could be your classic LMB, BG, CC pond.

I know you probably have your doubts regarding the ability of a 1/2 ac BOW to grow trophy fish. If well managed you can produce trophy fish as several forum guys can attest in very skinny water. There's a fella I know just down the road with a .2 acre pond and he's raised 2 lb RES, BG, and YP in it. Something to consider.

Thanks for the info...

Does anyone have any experience with solar powered well pumps? either a large gpm DC pump, or what it would take to run a decent AC pump with an inverter from the solar cells...?

I looked into it a while back (solar pump) and in my situation it wasn't economically feasible. The start-up motor draw was the killer.

Me too - solar array was going to be huge to try and run the pump...they laughed at me when I asked for a proposal.

Joe, you won't need to run this thing 24/7 unless you try to build a 4 acre pond with a 40 ac watershed. Try getting used to the idea that smaller can be better. You could even do 4 individual 1/3 acre ponds and have a crazy variety of ponds! Catfish pond with monster FC, BC, and CC's. Crappie pond with single sex crappie going 15+". SMB/YP/RES pond. LMB, HSB, BG pond. Man, that sounds like fun!

I saw your creek near your property - do you have rights to pump from the creek? A trash pump run a few times a year could help you keep the water levels stable. But again, if you have only 1 acre of water your precipitation could go a long way to keeping your BOW[s] full without the need for a well.

Joe,

I would get back in touch with the nrcs guy and find out why the low recommendation. I would think you would be able to at least do 1.5 acres. I would not suggest building in the flood plain or pumping out of the creek for water as you will run the risk of introducing species of fish that you do not want in your pond. As far as the windmill goes it sounds like you are trying to avoid running electricity to your site. The price for digging a deep enough well should be about the same for an electric pump or windmill. For my money I would like to flip a switch when I need it versus depending on enough wind. Flow rates given for those windmills usually are under ideal (high wind) conditions. You may not have that when you need it. Adding a well should definitely allow you to build a larger pond. The nrcs should be able to give you a proper water deficit to calculate how big of a well you need.

Joe ...I don't recall seeing how deep your pond would be. The formula for deciding pond size uses annual rainfall, watershed, , runoff potential of watershed(soil type , slope , and vegetation). The volume of water to fill your pond is measured in acre/feet. A 1/2 acre pond with an average depth of 7 feet holds 3 1/2 acre feet of water. My pond is in North Texas and we have similar rainfall and heat as you. With that said, my 100ac watershed with high runoff potential will not even come close to keeping a 5 acre (12' average depth= 60 acre/feet) pond full...hope this helps..du

One would never pump water from a creek without screening thus preventing introduction of invasive species...Sorry Joe just figured you already were aware of that.

Joe as has been said, in most cases pumping from a stream is not a great idea, but you might want to be prepared for a drought.
Check the stream for species of fish and determine if you want to use it as a back up plan to keep your pond from drying up.

The main supply of water for my pond comes from gravity siphon pipes from a stream, but the stream only contains trout, PS's, and crayfish which I already have in the pond, this is acceptable to me because without stream water I would have no pond.

Well I met with the guy that has the large pond. He has just recently completed its current stage. I guess he actually does dirt work for a living, and has been selling the dirt out of his pond. At $3.50 a yard, he had just sold 90,000 yards before I met with him. Wow

Its a pretty large pond. He claimed it will be about 10 acres when full, to me it looked to be around 6 for now. He said at the deepest it was a bit over 20'. He was filling it with a regular AC well pump running around 40 gpm. He said it was costing him around $70 a month to run, but that it had brought the pond up about 4 feet in the last 2 months. To me, doing it this way just might be the best. I know what I want, and if I can get the electric company to put in service, its probably the way i'll end up supplementing. If I had to run it for 6 months out of the year, at $70 a month, the $420 spent would be worth it from the enjoyment my family and I will get.

I spoke with him for quite a while, and am going to have him come look at my site in the next week or two. He did tell me that he can dig 5000+ yards per day with his excavator. This is at $1000 a day, 10 hour days.

In the beginning I was figuring a 3 acre pond at an average of 6' deep. He suggested averaging 10'. I think 3 acres at a 10' average is about 48,400 yards.

One of the things I havent mentioned is that I not only want a pond to fish in, but I would also like to be able to test my jetski's in it also, hence the reason for the large size...

Although that stream is there, I dont know that it actually flows enough water to keep a trash pump running. When I walked it a month ago, it didnt seem very deep. Who knows, Just to help in the initial filling, I may rent one and try it...

Supplemental irrigation from creek thread

http://www.pondboss.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Main=13755&Number=164248#Post164248

Agreed creek water is not great solution, but can be managed with box screens. All the fish I've ever seen cycle through a trash pump were confetti...but better safe than sorry.

I would imagine you have bullhead, shiners, creek chubs, channel cats, fathead minnows, green sunfish and crawfish in a little midwest creek like that...many species that aren't part of your plan. Should exercise some caution. Sounds like Cecil has done this before he's probably open for a PM on the topic. He's great people!

Thanks teehjaeh57


a few other calculations I have just been looking at...

a 3 acre pond with an average 10' depth holds ~10,226,430 gallons...

A 40 gpm pump running continuously for 6 months should provide 10,368,000 gallons...

So with no rain, evap, or leakage involved, it should conceivably be full in around 6-7 months...

What else am I missing?

Aside from leakage and evaporation? The amount of water that will take to saturate the soil in the pond, and getting a well to pump at least 50 gpm. If one will pump only 40 gpm, then you'll be behind the curve if the screen starts to plug. Personally, I'd go with the maximum GPH that the authorities will allow. I went with a 1 hp motor that pumps 28 gpm, and I wish that I would have at least doubled that. My driller doubled up on the screen so clogging won't be an issue for a long while.

Little update...I went over and dug 4 test holes on 4 corners of where the pond should reside...They were each about 11' deep. All I found was some almost black clay. Not red like we usually see here in Oklahoma...It was basically the same all the way down. One of the holes had a very little amount of sand, but not enough to matter....

The land next to mine is 10 acres, and is tilled right now, you can look across is and see a distinct line where the soil goes from red to black. Its very weird....

The thing I found odd was that we had just had some rain a day or two before, but I never hit water...Could that be from the clay content never letting the water soak in, and basically making it runoff?

Did you ever find anything out on your pond you are wanting to build?

probably so jxo. fat clay will only take in 6% above optimimum moisture when undestirbed or in its natural state. no water is probably a good thing. 5,000 cy a day on a trackhoe wow it must be a monster that is equivilant to about 650 10 wheel dumptruck loads of dirt

i have built 5 acre ponds for the nrcs in oklahoma with only 40 acre watershed. i think u just need to tell them you want bigger. a lot of times they go for the most feasible pond to build in a certain area due to terrain etc. i built one today staked by the nrcs with 6 acres watershed it was about 1/4 acre. just let them know your willin to spend more for a bigger pond and keep in mind there main pond staking is for ranchers who just want a watering hole that wont go empty and not take up much of there pasture. they like them small and deep.i'm not familiar with oklahoma county's field staff but in osage county,washington county,tulsa county and the stillwater office they will go to great lengths to help you

No real updates as of yet...I did talk to Mike Otto for about 30 minutes one night...Very nice guy....


We are trying to buy another 10 acres that is next to our 16. That would give us 26, and will allow us to move the house and shop a little farther away from where the pond will go...


We have had a few flash floods this year, which are the only ones I can remember for a very long time. So I decided it would be a good idea to go over and see where/how the water was flowing...

Here's a rundown...

This is standing on the west property line between my 16 acres, and the 10 we are trying to buy. I am looking north in this pic...



Same spot, but looking south. All this water is flowing south...


This just shows the depth of the above water



This is looking north in the middle of my property, right where the middle of the pond should go. If I were to turn the camera to the right and look slightly south, this water dumps into the creek.




I sure wish I already had this done, and could have been capturing all the water...

Mike Otto is a great guy and very funny in person.

Good idea on looking at your place during a flooding event.

This looks like a perfect place for a pond.

Long time....no update...

Here's a little update with some more questions...

In June of 11', we purchased another 25 acres that attached to our original 16. There was a farm lease on it, that runs out at the end of December 2011. Here's what we own now...



The farmer has taken his fences down, and basically is giving up his lease now.

I have made a couple calls to some contractors, and feel somewhat discouraged...I've met with 2 guys so far, both are supposed to be getting back with me. I am meeting with another guy tomorrow morning, on the phone he was talking about $2.50 a yard to move it on site...40,000 yards time $2.50 a yard is $100,000....that's not even close to doable....

Am I expecting too much for too little?

I feel like the problem is that I can't get a decent bid. It seems like everyone wants to beat around the bush on stuff. I dont expect someone to give me an exact dollar figure, but somewhere in a $6000 range would be nice. Guys want to talk about hourly rates, then want to talk about by the yard rates, but dont seem to be able to give me an estimate of how many yards they can move per day.

I dont like the idea of "lets start at $15,000 and see where we make it." I'm afraid I'd end up with it only half done, then be screwed.

The thought has crossed my mind about renting a large tractor and large scraper for a month, doing most of the work myself, and consulting with someone throughout the process, then maybe hire them to do the finish work...

Any advice from guys that've done it...?

I haven't done it because:

1. I have never run a dozer.

2. I have seen good dozer drivers and see just how much a good one can get done.

Have you talked to Mike Otto?

In a perfect world somewhere upstream would be enough elevation gain that you could gravity-feed the pond through a pipe and some filters. However I think that is frowned on in most areas.

But yeah, the going estimate around here in WNY is ~2K per 1/4 acre for ave 10ft no transporting of soil. My desired 1 acre pond wound up deeper with less surface area due to some miscalculation but since I like to dive, I will take it. So if it were around here for a 3 acre pond averaging 10ft would be $24K, probably more as you have to move the soil a greater distance unless you make islands and peninsulas (which I would have done in a larger pond) to prevent having to move the soil so far.

I heard around here we need ~6 acres of watershed per acre of pond, but if you get really lucky and hit a spring which is sourced by a lot more area than you think, then bonus! I didn't get lucky in the pond, but there is a good spring that dries in the summer up hill that runs into it for a few months out of a year.

To be perfectly honest I don't know what my watershed is, but I think it is around 10-12 acres or so into my 0.7 pond based on the little research I was able to do myself. I am a tad worried that some of our drier summers will cause quite a variation in height, but not about to drain drinking water tables with a well to fill a pond. I don't believe 6 acres per 1 acre claim either.

Annoyingly just down the road a quarter mile away a new house was built with an artesian (sp?) well which had so much back-pressure the water sprayed out of the lid like a fire-hydrant until they could cap it better. No pump required. I would probably hit the salt layer below before I saw water like that and be able to raise ocean fish. Oh, and we get natural gas in our wells which makes things "interesting".

-Mark

more questions....I guess this shows how far I'm willing to go to get this done...



How many people have built their own 2+ acre pond out of flat ground? This is why my cubic yards are so high.

I've been looking at the idea of buying a motor scraper to try to do the majority of the work. Maybe a CAT 613B (11 yard), a 615C (17 yard), or a Deere 862B (17 yard). I wonder how much of the pond can actually be done with the scraper.

I've been kicking some more math around....as an example in a 613B, say I can get 10 yards in, with a 10 minute cycle time. Thats 60 yards an hour, 600 yards in a 10 hour day. In 90 days I could move
54,000 yards. I dont know if those numbers are realistic or not...

Time I've got and have no problem using....Money I've got, but am not willing to invest the same amount that I paid for the land...

Do you own a good sized tractor? If you do, you could buy a scraper to pull behind it and move dirt much faster than a scraper and it will save you from being beat to death.

Have you dug any test holes to the depth that you want the pond? If you haven't, I'd strongly suggest it. If you run into ground water, the motor scraper won't do much good.......

If you do run into ground water, just remember that if you don't pack clay into the pond bottom/sides, your water level will go up and down according to how wet it is out.

I do not own a tractor nearly big enough to do any major work with....


I did dig 4 12' deep test holes a while back. This was within a week of rainfall, and never did hit any water. I think the clay content of the soil is so high that most of the water runs right off...I wouldn't mind trying a 20' hole or so, but don't have the means to dig it...

A pound of planning is worth a ton of dozer work.