Hello all:

Sorry been a while - as promised I've been dedicated to increasing my knowledge of the products working closely with manufacturer, applying the product on test projects, and working with the Pond Boss himself in order to arrive at this point. What point is that? Here's an update:

I have a attained a working knowledge of the product through a few successful application experiments in addition to working with the polymer manufacturer to a point I feel comfortable addressing questions and providing some direction for those who need help.

I have successfully negotiated a Pond Boss member discount for orders I place to the company in return for serving as a primary contact point to educate and direct any inquiries. However, anyone is free to seek information from me and order directly from the company - my help is not conditional in any manner. I am here to try and provide direction, education from my experiences as a pond owner and fisheries management professional, and hopefully a solution for pond seepage issues.

As this product serves as direct competition for a Pond Boss resource guide advertiser, out of respect for Bob and Mike and their paid advertisers, I needed to ensure I was complying with appropriate rules of engagement prior to promoting the product. I will now be listed in the Pond Boss resource guide as an advertiser, so that challenge has been addressed and resolved. I appreciate your collective patience - I wanted to ensure I did this the right way, regardless of the outcome or length of process.

I welcome a PM anytime if you need information or advice - I am here to help and look forward to working with you.

TJ

So, does it work? What kind of leak did you have? Did you have to dredge a bit first to get the muck out before application? Is there a Pond Boss discount?

teehjaeh57, thanks for the phone call again. I think I do have most/almost all of my leakage at the dam side. The rains we've had lately have exposed this. I think I'm ready to give this stuff a try even though I am a partial groundwater pond.

I am also thinking about trying the product but money is a little tight right now and would like to see if any others have good results before jumping in.

TJ and I had a great visit the other day on this. Like you said Jason money is tight right now for me also but this is something I am excited to try. My leak may be more than it can handle but it does sound promising. We have had a wet start to the summer here in Missouri and more to come this week by the bucket loads. I think it would be a good year for me to try.

Again thanks for the visit and the time TJ
David

teehjaeh, sent you a pm.

Tim feel free to PM me and I will provide all the information I can.

Great meeting you, Tim - and you're welcome! Happy I learned more about your pond and hope I can help down the road.

Good meeting you, Dave. Ping me anytime if I can help provide some direction.

With TJ's assistance I think I'm gonna give this a try in about a month or so. Any advice from pond owners who have tried similar treatments? Or am I gonna be one of the first guinea pigs?

I just put 10 units in my 1 acre pond about 2 weeks ago with TJ's advice and assistance in obtaining the product. My pond was losing over 5" per week in the cooler part of spring. My current rate of loss is only about 2.3" per week during a much hotter time period. That is about equal to the National Weather Services evaporation loss observations for my area in July, so I am very happy with the early results.

For the application I flagged off 10 equal sections of my pond then used an inflatable raft with a trolling motor. I would throw in a scoop of part A and my son would throw part B on top of it until we had an entire unit in each section. Be sure to do it when there is no wind. It is a real mess in the boat when it gets wet. Also it stays suspended for some time and will easily blow to the end of your pond which will mess up your coverage.

I'll continue to monitor my results and give updates. Good luck with your project!

Hey Mark that is awesome news and valuable information for us all. Let's keep tracking results - but glad it appears like a successful project.

Josh and Mike Otto are working a couple leak issues in TX and I'll be sure to have them report their experiences ASAP if we go with Soilfloc.

So far, so good!

Mark just completed a big project in up near Omaha. Call me for details, worked out pretty slick with his application modifications.

That is encouraging I will keep monitoring all this. It has been very wet year around here. I still hope to give this a go in the near future.
David

TJ I'm hoping to give you a call in a bit. I've taken new measurements and want to treat my targeted areas only. I want your opinion and thoughts on it. Then I think I'll order the product.

No problem, we can figure out the best plan of attack.

Just spoke with Mark on some stocking strategies and he mentioned the pond is holding tight! Awesome news for sure.

Awesome! I'm hoping to pick some up Tuesday and give it a shot in a few weeks! Fingers crossed.

I ordered some a few weeks ago and now am getting ready to apply. After opening the 2 pails they both look exactly the same. I am trying to seal a very small .07 acre pond which leaks out the bottom. Was just wondering if part a and part b look a like. Thanks

Okay my mistake. After a closer examination of the 2 by using a teaspoon placing the 2 side by side I can see a difference especially in the color of the 2. One is a much brighter white that the other one and there is a real small difference. Sorry about jumping the gun. I guess my eyes are not as good as they once where.

I would be interested in more information on this product.can you give us more information or should I just go online.

Per my posts, I'm happy to help anyone with free consultation on any project or just to help troubleshoot and outline options - feel free to PM me. I've worked with a couple dozen of the Pond Boss family and have several successful projects under our belts. If Soilfloc is a sound solution, I can provide a PB discount when ordering through me. Regardless of whatever you do, I'm still here to help the forum community anytime - feel free to reach out!

TJ

See you tomorrow!

TJ,

This conversation has me curious. Ha anyone tried applying the product to a water table pond during full pool? I am wondering whether it would seal and help stabilze the pool level.

Bill D.

My thought would be yes but that goes both ways, no water out, no water in. Unless you have surface water to make up for the loss of evap and minimal seepage you will end up with a mud pool at some point. I could be way off on my thinking but I would assume being a water table pond it would be bad.

Ben,

Thanks for the input. I have a huge water shed so runoff water is not a problem for me. For example, we got 3 inches of rain the last couple days and the pond rose nearly 3 feet. I also have a well I can use to supplemet if required. The pond is not large; less than half and acre. My thought was "what if" I didn't lose water, or lost less water, to the water table when it drops. I can easily compensate for evaporation loss.

Then heck yeah I would look at it! It would be nice not to have water table fluctuations in the pond. Can I ask why a water table pond in the first place with that much runoff, I estimate at least 18 acres of watershed based on that rise unless it is actually coming from underneath.

More than 18 acres but the ground was so dry it took a lot of it.

It's a water table pond because the bottom is gravel, sand and stone with just a little clay. As the water table is very high here, it works even though the level goes up and down with the normal water table fluctuations; about 4 feet fluctuation.

The one thing I see I would lose though is, now the pond rises above the water table and then "flushes" the excess water into it. If I seal the pond, I lose the water exchange I enjoy now.

I have this issue posed to the technical team - will relate info soon. I know the polymer is designed to be used to in sand, gravel, shale, rock, etc. - however it's the hydraulic pressure from EITHER side in a water table pond that has me guessing a bit. If water table pressure exceeds head pressure form pond, will the seal hold? I'll relate research ASAP - this is good for me to learn.

What I learned RE true water table ponds:

For existing water table ponds sealing can be done. This is a situation where I like to see bentonite used with the sealant, adding inches to the bottom. Or, I�ve seen dragging the bottom of the pond to disturb the top 2� (4� max) prior to applying be very effective as well; this is where ponds need to have good clay content. People will be concerned that the sediment will settle out too fast, but it won�t be tight until the polymer meets with it. It should be done in one application if possible, meaning the drag happens (slow drag) in front of the applicator in his boat.

I don't know if treating a water table pond is worth the risk, frankly. If there existed a small cell upon which one could experiment at low cost, I'd be more inclined to recommend it.

Hope this helps.

Thanks for following up TJ. Much appreciated. I agree with you. After looking at the pros and cons, I think I will just let my little puddle stay water table and enjoy the nice water exchange with each rain.

Hey Mark - any updates on the pond sealant project? How was your SD fishing trip? We need updates and photos of your trophy YP and WE!

TJ - Great trip to SD. Lots of action for an August trip. Nothing huge but a number of WE in the 20' to 23" range. Also a lot of nice SMB, makes me really look forward to getting them going in my pond.

The SoilFloc is doing its job well. Still running at about that normal 2"/week evaporation loss. With the rains we've had I have not run my pump since introducing the sealant in early July. Before, even with these rains, I would have been running it every week to 10 days. Really happy with the results.

We need photos to substantiate these fish!

2" weekly is music to my ears - that's about what I'm seeing with evaporation at the farm on my treated pond, also. I'm stoked the leaking issues were resolved - another successful project! Thanks for the update - call me anytime for help.

I just applied one unit of this along my dam last night, which is just over 5000 sq ft of product. I believe my leak is on the face of my dam so I'm attempting to spot treat my first time. I can't tell if it worked yet obviously and won't be able to tell for a couple of weeks when I turn my well off. But wanted to note a few things about the application process while fresh in my mind.

1). Rather than throwing 2 ounces of product out at a time as recommended I put 28 ounces of each product into a hand held fertilizer spreader and spread it. This was approximately enough product to treat 150 sq ft at a time. Since I was only treating 15 ft out from my dam I had alternating flag colors along my dam at every 10 ft. These designated my 150 sq ft units to be treated.
2). We began by anchoring in each unit and spreading the product. But after treating about 4 units the product created a slime so slick we could no longer pull up the anchor. So we had to come up with a Plan B.
3). For the rest of the face of the dam we filled 2 spreaders at a time and found a boat pace that allowed us to apply at about half rate. So we simply drove back over a second time and attained the full rate application. This worked much better. Although if treating an entire pond I think having people controlling the boat with ropes from shore would be the best route to apply thoroughly.
4). Make sure that you have plenty of wet and dry towels in the boat. I don't think there is any way to describe how slick and slimy anything becomes when a small amount of this product gets on it with water. It was nearly impossible to stand in the boat after the first 20 minutes.
5). Put your pets somewhere away from this water for a few hours. My dog drank some and he struggled as it seemed to gum up his throat and he was left puking and coughing for 10-15 minutes.
6). I'd advise wearing eye protection. I got just a bit in my eye and it bothered me for 20-30 min.
7). I lost 20-30 FHMs that were feeding on the surface and had their gills get gummed up due to the polymer.
8). The water seems a different color and quality today. TJ said it would clear my water up, which there seems to be some of. But it also appears to have made it more blue than it has been the last few weeks. It seems to have a similar appearance to when I apply dye. I'm guessing the floculation and settling of suspended particles caused the change.

All in all it took about 2.5 hrs with 2 guys to apply one unit. Although if we would've used the back trolling and spreading method from the beginning I think we could've done it in less than an 90 min. We spent the majority of our time trying to pull up a slimey anchor rope and move to the next treatment area and then coming up with another idea of how to apply the product. If it works it is certainly worth the money, time and effort.

And if he wants I'll let TJ post the photos/video I sent him. I don't know how to post pictures on this site yet and I'm sure he does.

Product gets very slimy - I nearly ate the gunwale several times during my first application. Backtrolling or ropes from shore on bow and stern are the way to go. If you would have mentioned the anchor I would have warned you, sorry Corey!

Keep us apprised, can't wait to hear your results!

I have a 3/4 acre pond approximately 13 feet deep and its leaking a couple inches a day. This happen a while back and we discovered a hole about the size of a tennis ball in the bottom. It leaks into what my neighbor thought was a spring but it's lake water. I had an excavator contractor dig, chase and recompact the hole about a year ago. It held just fine and now it's leaking through the same hole system again because the spring on my neighbors property just started running again. With a hole the size of a tennis ball would soilfloc be a possible solution? I don't want to have to drain to repair again. Thoughts????

Hi Tm

Feel free to ping me at tj@hudlandmgmt.com and let's chat about solutions.

Welcome to the Pond Boss forum family!!!

I am new to this forum, but found it while trying to get information on soilfloc. Like most people on here I was at the end of my rope with my leaking pond. I had 4 leaks in the dam that I could see the water running out of and down the dam creating a mud field at the foot of the dam. I had tried putting a concrete collar around the overflow pipe, that didn't work. I removed the overflow pipe recompacted clay in the hole and trench, that didn't work. I was contemplating totally rebuilding the dam structure at an estimated cost of $5000 when out of desperation I searched online and found soilfloc. I called their office spoke to a very knowledgeable person who got me set up. I applied the product as instructed and within 48 hours my leaks had 95% stopped and at 4 days had completely stopped. this product is absolutely AMAZING!! I fixed my leaks for $500!!! It is not difficult to apply but it is a pain to clean off of your boat, and I would wear clothes you don't mind throwing away when you are done. Once the product touches water it begins to gel, and if you are sweating it gets everywhere. But it is worth the little bit of pain to fix the leaks.

Welcome to the forum! And, thanks for posting about your leak stoppage. I hope your repairs hold. Do you know what caused the leakage? Is the pond new; do you have muskrats; trees, esp. dead ones on the dam? If you will ,tell us more about your pond such as size, your goals for it, its age, dimensions, what fish are in it, on and on. You'll quickly see we pondmeisters are completely absorbed by all this pond "stuff", whether it be our own ponds or someone else's.
Enjoy.

I have no idea what caused the leaks. The pond is about 12 years old. I have never seen muskrats beavers or anything. The pond is 100'x200' 12' at the deepest when full. There are no trees on the dam but there are some below it. The pond is stocked with catfish largemouth and has a ton of bull frogs, I also think there is a few grass carp in there. I did not stock I bought the property 2 yrs ago to eventually build a house on.

Great to hear the positive feedback, Capt04 - and welcome to the forum! I've helped coordinate 15 projects at this point and have seen remarkable results myself.

OK, I finally have what I believe to be as close to a scientific analysis of what SoilFloc did to my pond as I think I'm going to get. Instead of an entire application to my pond, I simply tried spot treating with one unit (a bag of Product A and a bag of Product B). When rehabbing my pond, I had bentonite available and was worked into the soil up to about 3 ft. from full pool. Upon filling my pond it came up 8" per day until I got over the part of my pond that had not had bentonite applied. At that point I began going from 8" of water level increase to 1.5" of increase overnight. I knew I was in trouble immediately. As I kept the pond full this became it appeared I was losing less yet I knew I was still losing a significant amount of water. At ice out this spring I finally shut off my well and let the only influx of water be rain water and water from my geothermal system. To my estimation, my geothermal should be able to keep up with evaporation when its running hard. But it wasn't. In fact, when my geothermal was running non stop I was losing 1/2" or slightly more per day. So with TJ's help I decided to apply SoilFloc. At first I wanted to treat the entire .6 acre pond, but out of curiosity I decided to try spot treating the dam first. My dam is roughly 300 ft. long and the width of untreated pond down to the bentonite treated area I estimated at 10ft. So assuming this was the worst of my water loss I decided to treat this roughly 3000 sq. ft. of dam with SoilFloc.

Upon treatment I became concerned that I had wasted my time. My dam runs from southeast to northwest. The day I applied I had a NE wind of less than 5mph. There wasn't a ripple on the lake. But with this slight NE breeze I was hoping it would push it up against my dam rather than toward areas of the lake that I didn't feel were of concern. When applied the polymer kinda floats on the surface therefore wind, even a slight drift, is a concern. Just as I had finished my treatment the wind switched more to an easterly direction and there was a noticeable movement of the polymer up against my west shore. I began to assume the treatment was going to hit a part of my lake I wasn't as concerned about.

For 3 weeks post treatment I tried keeping my water level 6" or so above full pool to increase hydrostatic pressure on the polymer. Quickly I felt some difference had been made as usually when I try to go above what I call 'full pool' my well can barely raise the water at all. And I was gaining substantially after the treatment. Probably close to an inch a day I was now raising the water level. But I wasn't certain as the water levels were now different. So I waited and waited for the water level to get down to 'full pool' so I could compare apples to apples.

Prior to treatment when my pond was at 'full pool' and the geothermal was running 24/7 I was losing 1/2" per day. Well over the last 4 days combined under those same conditions (there could be evaporative differences I suppose) I lost 3/4" or slightly less in total. So over a 4 day period I lost 1-1/4" less water than what I would have lost prior to treatment. My best calculations come out that one single unit of SoilFloc has saved me roughly 20,362 gallon of water over the last 4 days. That's the equivalent of having a 10 gpm well running for 1.4 of those 4 days (don't check my math!!).

My plan moving forward is to apply another 2 units of SoilFloc along the rest of my pond that did not have bentonite worked into it. I hope to seal the pond up even tighter and have the water in this pond continually spill over into my big pond just from the water added from my geothermal unit. I am very pleased with my perceived results at this time. I will keep this thread updated as I gather further info.

That's great news to hear, Corey...I'm so glad to learn of the improvement. Let me know what else I can do to help, here anytime!

Now just find a quick, easy and cheap way to get rid of all of the carp in my 20 acre pond. That's not asking too much is it?

Oh, and remind me to proof read my posts. Wow, that was atrocious. That happens when watching over a one year old and trying to post detailed information I guess.

Corey, I figured out your 20 acre pond. Blow the dam with TNT, excavate where necessary, create levies and 5-6 separate 3 acre ponds with different fishery goals. Each can have a couple 1/4 acre forage ponds dedicated to keeping base diverse and healthy. If you'd like me to draw up the blueprint and find a contractor, just say the word.

Lol. That'd be great but I'd need to find a divorce attorney as well because I'm positive my wife wouldn't be up for breaking up the aesthetics of our big pond.

Yeah, I'm also married to a narrow minded woman.

Is this product intended to be used in a full pond, dry pond or both? If a dry pond is alright then does it need to be filled immediately following an application or can it be applied and wait for mother nature to fill?

I have 1 acre pond that leaks down to about 1/4 to 1/2 full ever since the previous owner had it dug out. Went too deep hitting rock and gravel is my theory. Only owned the place for a year and didn't know the pond leaked until this summer when it started going down about 1 inch per day. Also, what is the estimated cost to cover a pond this size?

Yes I know the feeling - mine said " your not floating no ugly pallets in there for the minnows to breed- they will need to rent a room or something - I don't want to look at that trash."

Hi Archer, welcome to the forum! I sent you a PM - feel free to reach out anytime - happy to try and help however I can.

TJ

You can read the above to get more of the story on what TJ and I have done but here is my latest observation....

After 2 weeks to the hour my pond has dropped 2.75". Prior to SoilFloc treatment my pond would've dropped 6.5" MINIMUM. So my water loss has been cut down by more than .25" per day. In fact I think it's been cut by well over that as my geothermal is not dumping water into my pond at near the rate it was 6 wks ago when I took measurements prior to treatment. Unfortunately my geothermal water input isn't a variable I can get a good read of without putting in quite a bit of effort. But it has been running at least 6 hrs a day less than 6 wks ago.

Again I spot treated along the dam of my .6 Acre pond where I assumed the majority of my seepage was occurring. I only used one unit! I'm shocked by the results so far. Much better than expected. I still plan to add at least 2 more units in hopes of sealing it up even tighter and have my geothermal water become overflow into my larger pond below.

Got one unit from TJ (few weeks ago) and have been trying to get it applied to a small pond we have that is used for kids to fish in but when the weather was good I didn't have the time and the pond was low. Now that I have the time and the water level is back up (by pumping)the wind has picked up with 23 mph gusts. Looks like next week the wind will lay some and hopefully I will get it applied. Got a good price and TJ got me a good shipping price also.

Wow, what a turnaround! I'd say I love being a part of a happy ending, but that would probably strike the more infantile forum members as exceedingly funny, so I won't.

Dang Jim, we need some calm days your way. Keep in touch - let me know how the application goes. Here to help always...it was really cool meeting and getting to know you.

TJ

TJ

Got'er done. Was able to apply the product this evening. The wind stopped and got it applied without a mess. I used the cup method of spreading the material rather than a spreader. Very little got in the boat. Probably could of cut the time in half using the spreader though. Could see it would be messier using the spreader. Will kepp you updated on the results.

I don't have any measurements to provide as my water intake is variable due to my geothermal and changing weather this time of year, but by eyeball studies and past experience it seems my pond is holding water better each week since applying the polymer. Just my very untestable opinion.

Last winter my pond was losing between a quarter and a half inch per day. This winter my water actually came up a bit (I have had geothermal running in both winters). The only treatment I used was one unit of SoilFloc along my dam. Prior to treatment I had constantly ran 5-10 gpm into my pond PLUS the geothermal water. Now I haven't added any water other than the geothermal since treating the pond in August. Seems to have worked a miracle for me.

This spring a hope to add a bit more SoilFloc in a few other areas I think I may be losing water so that my geothermal actually causes more overflow.

Great news, Corey! Keep in touch, let me know how I can help.

It appears that Soilfloc treatment has helped my pond some also. The problem is I have only been able to do a few small areas due to only a couple hours at a time of windless conditions. Is is almost constantly windy here in the winter and early spring.

I think I am going to create something to apply the polymer below the surface, and directly where it's wanted, so wind/rain is not an issue...Now, if I can only get TJ to send me some to play with....

Why couldn't you set up a trash pump with the inlet in the pond just below the surface and the outlet where the problem spot is. Then while the pump is running pour small amounts of part a and b together. The pump will mix them up and spit out a cloudy whitish water out of the outlet. I did this with plain polyacrylamide (PAM) before and it mixed it up just fine but did nothing for the leak. I only used very little though no where near the 100 pounds one unit would be. I believe soilfloc has some sort of polyacrylamide (PAM) in it. It is used for all sorts of things and there are many different types. It is used in trench irrigation to stop erosion, it is used in diapers because it absorbs a lot more water than the weight of itself. Once it touches water it is a slimy mess. Just a thought.

Rainman, Cool idea! I'm not sure if that would work though?

My understanding is that you need Part A of the mixture to grab suspended particles and clay and start pulling that together as it sinks to bind up all the surrounding loose soil. Then part B needs to glob it together and force it down the leaking spots. I think if you don't have enough suspended or nearby dirt to pull together that they advise adding bentonite clay to make sure you have enough.

I guess if your applicator could apply just under the surface and still have it go in a spread out distribution pattern while dry it might work....

I know for me, when watching how I applied it, that having it fan out in a powder 'mist' and lay in a very thin even layer over a wide swath of water was much more helpful. The floating swath would merge into the next floating swath before slowly sinking and this seemed to give me a better blanket of coverage.

For me, at least, if I threw a handful (from a measuring cup) and it landed in a C shaped pile in the water, it wouldn't fan out evenly by the time it hit the bottom.

How to reproduce that wide even layer before it starts sinking, AND to administer that even layer while under the water would be the design challenge.


Just knowing that soil floc works though has opened up a lot of new avenues of thought for me. I really would like a small forage pond and I really didn't know where or how to build one on my narrow lot. Now I know that all I need to do is dig a hole anywhere and seal it with soilfloc. Pretty powerful tool for anyone who wanted to dig forage ponds but didn't want to compact clay or buy a liner.

I think Soilfloc would ruin a pump, even a trash pump. I had some in a small plastic bucket, and used all of it I could see, dumping the dry residue. I later tried to use the bucket for water to clean floors. The residue clinging to the sides of the bucket, though hardly visible to the eye, clumped up and stuck to the bucket, made the cleaning rag slimy, and I threw the bucket away, as the slime was so difficult to remove.
I think my pond is now too clear to use Soilfloc (5 foot visibility). I am waiting for rain to muddy it up, and no wind.

Sorry Rex, I'm out and never had an opened bag to send you any. Had someone here in deep trouble and needed my help so I parted with my stash! If I order again I will be sure to keep some in a ziplock for you. I think Jeff [Canyon] has some left over product he was looking to dump - might be a good resource for you. No clue if he still has it or not.

John, I was getting ready to order a dose of this from TJ. I had not heard that you need suspended clay or sediment in the water in order for it to work. I had heard about throwing the two components, and then throwing bentonite on top of that, but I thought it might just be to help get it to the bottom of the pond quickly.
I'm going to be throwing into 12-13' of water. Hoping it seals at the bottom. My water has at least two feet visibility.
I've dropped about 14" in two months. I'd like to reduce that if I could.

Jeff

TJ,
In your experience, will the product not work as well in water that already is very clear? My water happened to have stirred up clay in it due to unwanted goldfish rooting in the mud and wanted crayfish also digging around for food. That set up a good gathering of suspended silt as the product sank.

I'm sure you applied this to ponds that were very clear already?

If Setterguy has too clear of water could he perhaps ask his buddy to drop his bass boat in there and roar around the pond a few times to get the bottom stirred up and then apply when the silt is suspended? Or use a trashpump and hose to power-hose the bottom in the shallows on a day with a breeze and see if the breeze moves the suspended silt through the water table before applying product?

Even a jet ski making a few laps around a small pond should stir the bottom up a bit? I've seen youtube videos of people holding the front end of a jet ski while standing in a small above ground intex pool and using it to drain the pool in a hurry (or use it as a giant water cannon to drench the neighbors...)

Good question: Turbidity of water does not have an impact on product's efficacy - I've used it personally in both scenarios and worked in both instances. The linear polymer does link with suspended clay particles and flocs the water resulting in improved clarity, sometimes vastly so, but it's not a prerequisite for application.

TJ - Let's say I get the tractor out and dig a mini pond, maybe 30' or so, kinda square, tapered kinda like a paint roller tray in sand. It's very coarse sand which holds it's shape and you can even sculpt this. Runoff has minimal effects as channeling and ruts go, but it does happen. Ground water in this area, well, you won't hit any for a ways. Probably only go 4-6 feet deep here.

Do you think this may work with the product?

Phil, too many applications ta the eyeballs? What does that ? have ta do with Polymer sealant if yer not gonna hit ground waster?

Don't know what waster is? Can you clarify?

From what was said, GW may not work because the flow direction (pressure) is under flowing in.

What is it with topical flow, maybe well water to keep the pressure on one side.

Something has to go with pressure, but if you won't see the pressure from under...

Yep, my math punishments...

My spelling prob, thanks to Catholic schools.

Getting spelling correct is an Individual choice within you. Is it necessary for a guy with a Camo Rig tho?

rex, i am sitting on about 300lbs of soilfloc. i'll trade you a ziplock bag full if you bring me 200 adult male coppernose bg..hahaha

lol Scott...Did you read "The Art Of The Deal" or something???

You should talk to CRAY here on the forum, He has some really nice 12-13" CNBG available. I don't think he has any soilfloc though.

I might buy some of your extra Soilfloc, if we could get it to NW Arkansas for a reasonable price.

Hey TJ, was gonna pm ya but thought maybe someone else would benefit from this ?
First an explanation about my pond/leak. Pre PB I had my pond dug. When it was done about two days later I noticed a white line about 4"s thick and 18-20' long about 3' below my overflow. Went over and found it to be hundreds of Cabbage butterflies drinking from a gravel vein. I just thought cool, a source of water(spring) to help fill the pond. Of course everyone knows what that really is a source for water to leave the pond. The pond is about 1/4 acre but I think from what I've read that I can probably pinpoint my app to about a stretch of 25-30'. I would probably feel more confident to do a double app about a month apart. Approximately how much do you est that I will need and cost including shipping to NE In ?

1 unit covers 4400 sq ft. Shipping for 1 unit varies from $75-$150 depending on location - business address typically runs cheaper. Wholesale pricing from Aquaben is $345-$350, PB discount ordering through me is 5%. Happy to help, let's talk when you get back home.

Will do.

So do you measure surface area to determine how much you need or acre/feet or ....?

Yes, surface area is what we use to determine application amount.

Mine is being shipped now.

Heck, I thought TJ would deliver it! He could show you how to apply it correctly then.

About the time TJ would haul a bunch of white powder down ta Texas is the time the troopers would stop him for lookin suspicious. Then he would be a guest of the state while the law figured it wasn't for the nose. Stay home TJ.

I have had no real window to apply more than a couple of pounds at a time here. The fact that it has to be applied when there is NO wind makes it very frustrating. I might have to wait many months for such a day here. I know the product can be effective, but such wind restrictions negate a lot. A pond could go dry waiting for a totally calm day. Call me frustrated. Still losing 1/4 to 1/2 inch a day, it varies.

I've applied it successfully in winds up to 7-8 mph. Summer and fall in Nebraska are a lot less windy than spring. Trees around the pond helps block wind too. Aren't you just applying a small area from shore? If so winds should impact your application far less than those in boats doing a full pond treatment.

Applying along base of dam from shore. The lady at Aquaben told me on the phone there should be zero wind when applying. Pond gets almost constant wind.

OK - just trying to relate my experience with the product - I don't know that NE gets any windless days in the course of the year. Maybe NW AR is the same way. I actually treated my pond with Sandra at Aquaben last March in 8-10 MPH winds - just an FYI. Pond partially sealed after the partial treatment - hit remainder of pond a month later to seal the remainder where I was unaware of additional leaks. Both days were about the same wind speed - treating from shore is a lot easier than trying to manage boat position and direction during very calm days, but from shore I don't feel it's as important. Up to you, just trying to help with the benefit of my experience with wind conditions.

If you are looking for low to 0 wind conditions, right before sunup until the sun starts to heat things up is your best bet.

That's when I treated, evenings...wind lays down all night allowing polymer to sink in treated areas. Worked so far for me.

Mine came yesterday. Now to find the right day when conditions are right and help is available.

DD1, TJ can help. You might want to reread (if you have 30 min of free time... ) this post in case it helps you.

Soil-floc project

Waiting for my soilfloc to arrive. Should be any day.
Measured water loss on Monday. I've lost 14.25" since Jan 1. Comes out to 1.676" per week. Obviously not enough loss to drain the pond and repair the entire base. Other ponds in the area have lost about half that amount. We had a couple of smaller snow falls during those two months. Not sure how much moisture that contributed to the water level. I'll be putting the rain gauge back out this week.
Supposed to get rain next week. I'd like to get the soilfloc down before the rains come in.
My pond sets low to surrounding hills, and is surrounded by trees. Very still in the evenings and mornings.

SetterGuy,
The only downside to rain is just brings some wind with it. If you do it before the rain that would be fine. If you do it after the rain and conditions are still very calm to achieve a good even application, even a slight overlapping application, their might be an advantage from another inch or 2 of water in the pond which will give more hydraulic pressure above the soilfloc to push it down into the cracks. It works best with the pond at full pool at maximum hydraulic pressure forcing the polymer to find the cracks. If the rain is a light rain it won't matter either way.

I had the ability to fill my pond to capacity using my well, I understand not everyone can do that

CC, I am going to do my dam. It wasn't cored when built. I can go to the back side and see that my water loss is under the dam. Now where is the bottom of the dam when the pond is full as it now is? That is what I have to figure out. SOMEWHERE I have pictures from 15 years ago.

Ok, I might actually wait until the rains come through next week, and look for a bit of a break in the weather. I've got branches out around the banks hoping for a YP spawn anyway. Makes total sense about the hydraulic pressure of a full pool.
Thx

Dave Davidson,
I'd be willing to help just to observe and learn how it's done. I'm thinking Soilfloc is in my future. I'm retired so I am available most any time.
Dave Goyne

Feel free to reach out anytime I am here to help anyone in need or answer questions. I have 4 projects pending right now and if they don't post results I'll keep everyone apprised. So far we're 28/30 with the two misses coming on coarse grind crosslink polymer and issues were resolved, but still not counting them as successful to remain objective. And, in the spirit of full disclosure, we're all still unsure how long the seal will last. Might be indefinite, might vary, we're still watching daily. Thankfully most guys are checking in with me often to report any issues - appreciate your feedback Jeff.

TJ-you mentioned you are not sure how long it could last. i would like to add that the wet place behind my dam (literally a swamp with reeds and cat tails growing) is still bone dry. the area was so heavily vegetated it was hard for me to tell exactly how big the area was, but i would guess somewhere around 800 sq ft or more of standing water. the standing water was gone in less than a week. i have since been able to go in the area with my tractor and skid steer and clean it up. i just looked back thru my notes and see that i sealed it about the end of july. my pond has stayed full this winter with all of the rain we had. i do have more soil floc that i am going to apply soon. i was still losing some water after the first treatment but not in a noticeable area like the place behind the dam. let's all keep reporting results.

Thanks Scott, every report is more science for us to share. How about some BG pics...been a while, you're doing some great work down there. Need to share your success with us!

dg84s, timing seems to be crucial due to wind, etc. What I don't know is where the bottom of the dam is. I found some pics of the dam when it was built and finished but how it relates at the now full pool is going to be a question. Since the dam was not cored, my most obvious problem it that it is leaking under the dam. That is what I'm trying to fix and will ignore the rest. I'm sure that I'm losing some water due to wicking along the sides but that is to be expected.

I've also been contacted by another member who wants to come along. Al Hall also hopes he can make it.

Joshua Flowers, a Pro who posts here is coming and his help/ideas will be invaluable. Actually he will be bossing the whole thing and filming it.

At this time, I have no idea how to schedule, in advance, for application on a day without wind.

DD1,
Wind isn't a terrible issue if you are treating the dam. You just have to be sure the wind is blowing towards the dam base When I used the boat and hand spreader technique, I needed to coat the bottom of my whole pond evenly and even a slight breeze would take the floating portion and make one swath (about 4' wide swaths of product floating on top) merge slowly into the next swath and then the next swath. Some of it sinks pretty quickly some stays floating and sinks more slowly.

If you had light winds going toward the dam and you purposely started say in a boat in the middle or at least on the 1/3 of the pond closest to the dam and started applying at a distance and worked towards the base of the dam you would have overlapping swaths with wind helping to push more and more towards the dam base. Apply even swaths towards the shore at the base of dam, do the shoreline extra heavy, then maybe go back in the middle and do another series of overlapping passes towards the base of the dam again. You would most likely have a great application then.

Have others applied to base of dam that can give their advice or experience?

I am continuing to watch this, I am afraid my leak is bad enough it would not work in my situation. I am loosing about 1.25 inches per day at full pool. It drops to a certain level and stabilizes. All the leaks everybody is working with is much much less. It is tough for me to find good clay around here to have it lined.

TJ, didn't you say that they used this material to seal ponds that were used in the oil industry? How long have some of those ponds remained sealed?

My test post was losing about 12" weekly - worked in that scenario, and the average loss from guys with whom I've worked are around 1"+ daily. Feel free to reach out anytime to chat, here to help in any way I can.

Yes, I was told they sealed slag pits which were gravel. I was not there to witness it...that's why I don't offer it as evidence if you get my meaning. Always try to emphasize the unknowns and under promise and hopefully over deliver since this is my Pond Boss family and all.

It rained a little here early this morning. After it quit, I noticed the air was dead calm. I took my remaining 43 pounds of Soilfloc and 50 pounds of fine grained Bentonite to the pond. I carefully applied the Soilfloc around the dam a quarter cup of A, quarter cup of B, until I had evenly applied all of it around the base of the dam. Just as I was finishing, a slight, variable breeze came up. Then I hand scattered the 50 pounds of Bentonite over the floating slurry of Soilfloc to help it sink as instructed by Ms Sandra of Aquaben Corp. After I finished with the Bentonite, a stronger breeze of maybe 10-12 mph came up out of the NW and eventually blew much of the floating slurry mixture to the SE corner of the pond. I am hoping enough of it sunk to do some good before this happened. I am hoping for a wind direction change before it all sinks in one place. So, YMMV.

FWIW, I have beach sand here down to 11', a thin layer of clay, then another 10' of beach sand. When I dig the small production ponds here I will be incorporating SoilFloc into the sand that is in the pond basin before I add any water to seal them.

DD1,
March and April are not good months for wind-free Texas days. If you're just going to treat a swath across the dam, is your plan to apply Soilfloc from the shore on foot or by boat? If by boat, a couple of guys on opposing shores with long ropes should be able to gradually pull you across the area you want to treat. I'm out of town until 3/14 but willing to help when I return. Let me know.
Dave Goyne
(l.goyne@sbcglobal.net)

We will be using boats. I'm thinking the toe of the dam is about 25 ft from the dam. I can see where it is coming out at the back. I have 1 unit of SoilFloc, the 2 bags, and think that should handle the leak if we hit it right.

DD, your situation sounds much like mine. And I was very happy with the results.

I have a feeling things will hold pretty well in the case of poorly-compacted soils. One thing I have seen here is ponds that fill up really fast after excavation tend to be "seepy". It is like the soil in the dam never gets a chance to settle, and then the slowly flowing water suspends the particles as it flows through.

Stop the flow, remove the water from between the particles, and the dam can settle better.

For me, being able to mow and clean up the backside of the dam will be a huge plus. I spent last fall nuking willows and pulling unwanted trees by hand. It would be nice just to mow the darned thing and keep the cattails off of it.

I hear you on the willow and cattail nuking, we get to add cottonwoods to the list, their tap root grows fast and deep. I try to pull everything I can, but sometimes have to resort to glyphosate.

Just curious. Has anyone done a video of an application. I must have missed it if it's in an earlier post. I'll be applying it from a small rowboat. I guess throwing a cup of each. Then maybe throwing a cup of bentonite.
I'd like to see an effective throwing technique before I go throw hundreds of dollars around the pond. I'm going to stretch a rope across the pond, go straight across, then move the rope by 5' or so and repeat. After reading John's post, about it all blowing into one end of the pond, I am going to wait until I have absolutely no wind. I think the evening would be best, then it has all night to settle, "if the wind stays down."

I think I'm going to wait until after the YP spawn. I don't think they will have any ribbons along the dam, where I'll apply the soilfloc, but I'm not taking any chances.

After going back and looking yesterday, it appears the Bentonite did cause most of the Soilfloc to settle where I needed it, but I did have some residue blow into one corner, which caused a heavier application there than intended. I definitely recommend the Bentonite. I used a quarter cup measure and flung out part A, then part B, then went back and flung handfuls of Bentonite over the slowly sinking slurry. I am pumping more water in today to see how it holds. I Think my leaks are mostly under the dam due to old roots through the old part of the dam and poor compaction in the new part.

Hope it holds better! Good luck!

7 new projects launching soon, I will keep everyone apprised of the results - everyone waiting for water temps to rise and some break in the Spring winds.

Joe seems to be having great luck with his SoilFloc down here TJ. Not sure if you have talked to him yet but I ran into him the other day and discussed it a bit. He is going about it quite a bit differently. He is just adding it along the edge as he raises the water. He stopped adding water when he got it to 9' deep. After 2 weeks he only lost about an inch of water, which was most likely evaporation. I'm not sure how much he was losing before, but it was astronomical amounts. His quote 'I wish I'd have known about this before refilling this pond several times'.

After warm weather the last 2 days the pond ice is receding. I can see about 2 feet of my shore line now. I can see the water level and can see that over winter I probably did lose closer to a foot of water over the past 4-5 months. That much easily could be a very slow leak plus some evaporation. Very happy with how my first application went since I did it in mid September and had immediate results the first winter.

Even if I have a slow seep somewhere, that is fine with me since now in the spring I have a little room for the topping off effect of heavy spring rains.

TJ, how warm is 'warm enough' in the water to do my spring reapplication? I don't want to wait till May but also don't want to apply to frigid water when it doesn't work well either... Probably have just about 1 unit left to reapply to the whole pond.

DD1, any updates on your application?

The consultant at Aquaben, Sandra, told me that Soilfloc can be used effectively at any water temperature as long as there is no ice near the application site.

We decided to address his issue differently, drain to lowest point until seep stopped, then treat and rise water levels and repeat. I haven't heard an update in a while, I am really happy it's working. Like all of us he's been pumping so much money and frustration into his leaking pond for so long he was almost ready to fill it in. I'm glad to hear things are improving, great to be a part of the solution!

Jeff, I was originally told by Aquaben the minimum water temp was 40, and they preferred warmer water as it helped accelerate the cross link expansion. They've also apparently instructed otherwise to some folks. All I can tell you is what has worked for me and others, so far all treatments were in water temps 40+. I think provided you're above that you're going to be fine. If you feel more comfortable waiting until you hit the 50-60 range, go for it.

TJ, any advice on whether there is a practical reason to do the application at a certain temperature vs another?

I did my applications when the water temp was between 40 and 50. I feel if I waited until later, the FA would interfere and gum up the works, so to speak. My first application was at 40 degrees, second about 43 degrees, and the last and by far the largest application was at 50 degrees. The first application of maybe five pounds stopped the leak I had through a filled in drainage ditch in the dam in 40 degree water.

I think if I tried to apply it in summer, the FA would catch most of the Soilfloc and keep it from being very effective. The additional step of treating for FA would have to come first. BTW, the lowest temperature we had all winter was 11 degrees F and it was very brief. Only a skim of ice ever appeared on the pond all winter, and the coverage was never complete.

Jeff good question, and at this point I think it's fair to say treatment can be made at any temps above 40, and a distinct advantage applying in cooler water is that one is likely getting ahead of vegetation establishment, which can impact the efficacy of the treatment by preventing access to the pond bottom. If vegetation serves as a possible issue, targeting treatment when vegetation is either still dormant in Spring or dying in Fall would be my recommendation. In new or turbid ponds which lack established vegetation I feel timing of application is not a significant concern, but finding conducive application periods of low wind is the primary concern.

Canyon creek, no time so far to do it. In addition, we're going to enlist the help of some strong back/weak minds teenagers.

Sounds good! If you have some reliable people operating ropes tied to boats or running a trolling motor using a water sock or dragging anchor or something to slow you down and give you control it should work well. At least have someone video it to share the fun with us

Joshua Flowers will be managing the job. And, the camera will be rolling.

I'd like to see some video. I haven't seen or heard of any. I still have not opened up the packaging. So still in planning stages.
My plan is to let this next few days of storms pass through. Hope to get started next week. (If the weather cooperates.)

I am glad I got my Soilfloc done 5 days ago. The rain today has added 4 inches of new water in addition to the 3.5 or so inches I pumped in late last week. Still 5.5 inches of space left before it spills over the E spillway. Maybe I will have some definitive results on the Soilfloc in a couple of weeks, depending on rainfall.

Backtrolling provides good boat control, still, using ropes and two helpers on bow and stern is best way to apply.

Regarding application - here's my application method: Throw AT water 2 OZ product A, then 2 OZ product B, covers 11 sq ft area. You can also toss few OZ of bentonite on top of A/B to help it sink. Move linearly to next 3.5x3.5 area and treat, repeat. Just like painting...cover entire area thoroughly. Any questions let me know can cover a lot more ground over the phone.

TJ:

Have you done any new constructions where the product was spread out over the ground, then the pond filled with water?

Or does it need to be incorporated into the ground like Bentonite, then compacted, then filled with water?

Have not worked any projects on dry application yet. It's not designed for dry application - BUT, they indicated folks have used it in conjunction with bentonite and also just the polymer with good results. Till into top 4" clay, then compact with 18-24" clay in 6" lifts. As soon as one of these projects is attempted I will include the forum on the process and results.

The way that stuff worked on my pond, I wouldn't be surprised if it would stop my bathtub from leaking after pulling the plug.

Rats. No clay locally, all sand. If I had good clay to compact in 6" lifts I wouldn't need it.......

I was going to dig a few 1/10 & 1/20 acre ponds in the sandy soil. No clay on site until 22' down..... I wasn't going to make them that deep.......

Maybe I'll have to be the guinea pig.

Scott maybe use backhoe and dig a mini pit 5x5x5 and we could treat it and see what happens. Way cheaper to try with 1 unit before proceeding. I would incorporate bentonite with the polymer if you can get it at a decent cost. If it doesn't work, you'll need another well maybe or liner. They claim it will, you know my position already - believe it when I see it.

No THATS an idea. No need for a mini backhoe - tractor and FEL will do that easily.

what about using a bucket filled with play sand, add a little soilfloc. drill a few holes in the bottom and see what happens?? just a thought. i still have 3 units of soilfloc that i just havent had time to apply. pond is full right now, our ground is so saturated from all the rain in the last few months. i am going to apply it soon. i can save a cup or two if anyone comes up with an experiment they would like me to try similiar to the bucket idea.

Scott I think that's a good test idea.

esshup,
If you had a small test pond, say 10x10 or 20x20, why not put a foot of water in the bottom so at least the powder can land in water or 'very wet sand' and float down to simulate what a 'on the water' application would be like. Then apply part B, then slowly add more water, as water level slowly comes up, reapply?

Does it have to be applied to dry sand and tilled under? You have the option to at least wet the sand or have temporary standing water and treat that right?

Right now I have the main pond which is 18" below full pool. I was going to dig some small ponds here this year, but they aren't constructed yet. I don't have any small new ponds in sandy soil scheduled yet this year.

We are tentatively scheduling to do my leaky dam this Saturday morning. It all depends on wind.

JohnF, any results to report yet?

Dave,
I am still watching it carefully. The damp spots behind the dam disappeared right away, and when we got the big rain three weeks ago, which filled within 4" of grassy spillway, no leaks reappeared. It still goes down some, but much slower than a couple of months ago. The clay in the new part of the dam was too dry when put in last summer, so I an still getting some settling there. A backhoe driven over that part last month made deep ruts that had to be filled in, so I am giving it more time before contemplating further action. It seems that it is easier to hold at a higher level than it was prior to the Soilfloc. I only used a half unit (55 pounds) total, plus 150 pounds of sodium Bentonite to help Soilfloc sink and prevent its migration from wind.

Thanks, I need to find some bentonite.

Dave sounds as though some folks are completing application of A and B with a final dose of sodium bentonite. The bentonite apparently helps encourage the linear and crosslink polymer to sink immediately in case there's some wind/current which causes them to drift. This is a new application suggestion from Aquaben which first was introduced by them a couple months ago. Apparently they are still learning, too.

FWIW I have never used the bentonite step in my treatments, and still achieved good results. I think it's more of a insurance measure than anything else - if it's cheap and available, might as well implement this step.

Found 50 pound bags of Sodium Bentonite at my local feed store.

John, I just found some also. Thanks

I just keep watching and waiting. I am so ready to try mine but am still afraid it is leaking too much. Once the spring rains start and mine comes up again I will see. TJ we had spoken and I will keep this in my mind.
Thanks guys

assuming no weather problems, I'll do it Saturday morn.

Plan: Mix the A and B along with bentonite.

Apply with cups or grass seeder.

Any thoughts?

That's what I did Dave, minus the bentonite. I just mixed part A and B in a small seed mixer and back trolled over the area I planned to treat. It worked great.

We did it Saturday. Joshua Flowers kept us pretty well on target. Al Hall(FIH) came from East Texas. My Grandson and his friend did the boat work. Wind was light and very little floated away. The stuff mostly sank when it hit the water.

NEDOC, we use a small scoop and made 3 tosses per time.

We treated the area that we THINK had the leak where it was running under the uncored dam. Of course, since I can't see the area under 12 to 15 ft of water, I'm keeping my fingers crossed. I also used bentonite.

I still have half of it left so I can do it again if we missed on this shot.

I live 70 miles away so will probably be able to check next weekend. Given a chance, I would be there every day and checking every hour. If it didn't work, I will blame myself for not being able to find the right place to treat. I have no reason to suspect the product.

No fish floated and we never noticed the water clearing.

Dave,
Did you take photos during the application? If so, please post them.

Glad the project went well, hope it finds your leak and slows or stops it. Unfortunately sourcing leaks is not an science, and frankly Soilfloc is not a guaranteed fix, even partially. However, we're looking at upper 80% success rate on projects thus far, so I'm very hopeful for good news.

I didn't take pics but Joshua Flowers did.

I'd sure like to see the pics.
Question, your earlier post gave me the impression you were going to use a spreader of some type, then your last post, it sounds like you tossed it. How can you tell you have 2oz? Which is supposed to cover 11 sq ft.
I haven't put any out yet. We haven't had any rain since Jan 1, well, less than an inch..
My pond has dropped 20" since Jan 1. One suggestion was to wait until you had a full pond, so the hydraulic pressures were greater. Now I'm thinking I have eliminated quite a bit of the bank area that I don't need to treat. The 20" vertical drop, exposes 40+" of shore.
I still just don't have any sort of feel for the application itself. I like the idea of mixing it in a spreader and broadcasting it out, but once again, how much is enough, without wasting a bunch?

SetterGuy, DD1 or Joshua may post more details, but Joshua had a scale and weighed out 2 ozs, put that amount in a scoop, then marked that scoop at that 2 oz line. After that, the 2 parts were put in separate buckets, and then just scooped out when thrown. To me at least, it worked well, and kept the Soil Floc amounts consistent for every throw.

Thanks. I'll have to get my scale up to the farm. 3.5 X 3.5 will be easy enough to estimate. Did you try to shake it out, over the water? Sprinkle it? Or throw it down, as has been recommended?

The boys threw it down.

It seemed to me that all the heavy mental lifting was done before the boat was ever deployed. Once the actual application process started, it went very smoothly with minimal delays.

I bought a small scoop at Walmart. 2 oz. just isn't much and doesn't cover a very big area. You have to think that it somewhat disperses in the water. And, it's tough to get the part B to hit Part A as it sinks. Then the bentonite on top of it has to be right.

I think mixing A,B and bentonite might work better.

For some reason, mixing is not recommended by AquaBen. I tried mixing a small quantity (couple pounds total) of A, B, and Bentonite (probably 75 % Bentonite by weight) as an experiment close to the bank, and it just fell straight to the bottom in a small area, and made blobs of "jelly" that I had to break up with a stick to prevent frogs and such from getting entangled and dying.

Dave,
Do you have any Soilfloc results to report?

John, I'm going there tomorrow for the weekend to check. It's 70 miles away and I've forced myself to stay away. I checked about every hour after we put it in but didn't expect any results that soon.

Lots of anticipation and almost scared to look.

Aren't you supposed to get more rain soon? From the South West?

My bad....seems there are several on here who don't live near to their ponds. Guess I am lucky...it is a 8 minute walk on a bad day.

Scott, slight chance of rain in the near future.

Thought I would report on the results I have had using Soilfloc Sealant. Ordered the product from TJ last August but it was later part of Sept or first part of Oct before I could apply to the pond. The pond I was trying seal was really small with steep sides and approx 10 feet deep. After applying it it was around 3 or 4 weeks before I noticed any difference in the amount of leakage. It went from around a foot a week to just a couple inches a week. The pond stayed up during the winter without any loss of fish. First time this had happen. Normally it went bone dry. Today the pond is doing ok. It might be losing 2 to 3 inches a week. I can live with this and if need be I can retreat it. I waited this long to share my results to make sure it would hold. Didn't want to post too soon and then have a blow out. Very pleased with the results of the product and if need be I will retreat. This pond is approximately 15 or seconds or less from our back door and the grandkids and kids of our friends enjoy catching fish from it. Right now we have a few channels, hybrid bluegill, and some hybrid stripers in it. They grow very quickly since we feed a couple times a day. Hope your results will be as good or better than mine. Will be contacting TJ soon to place another order for one other pond we have that is showing some increase in leakage. This pond is a lttle futher from the house. Probably 30 to 45 seconds.

Here is some photos of Daves application.





http://vid1027.photobucket.com/albums/y336/joshuaflowers01/Daves/IMG_0959_zpssodbr6bk.mp4

http://vid1027.photobucket.com/albums/y336/joshuaflowers01/Daves/IMG_0944%201_zpsti25alsc.mp4

FP
Sounds like my pond is like yours was. If I turn off the pump, lose a couple inches a day. 1acre, 10 ft deep. Mostly a swimming hole. Did you treat your whole pond? Did you know the level of leak? When left to its own, my drains down to 4' and stops with the same perimeter each time. I am very interested in the Soilfloc product. That was actually what brought me to this forum. I would be very interested in hearing more of your experience if you are willing to share. Thanks
Matt

FishinPal and Joshua Flowers, thanks for your info, pics, and videos. Will be very helpful, if/when I finally get around to applying the soilfloc. Thanks for posting!

Your welcome. This week I will be writing up some tips that Dave, FireIsHot, and I came up with during the application. Hopefully it will make it smoother when anyone applies it on their pond.

It looks like mine might have partially worked. I'm down about an inch or so during the past week. But, one wet spot behind the dam is now dry. That's on one side.

So, that means that we missed most of the leaky area. Gotta do some more figuring. I'm kinda interested in Fishing Pal saying that it took a couple of weeks. That gives me something to think about.

We only used about half of the product so I can do it again.

Dave/Josh,
Watching your video I see that you had one person in the boat working the position of the boat. You used a stationary line that spanned the pond. It looked like as the person wanted to move the boat that person would tug on the stationary rope to pull the boat down the line and then would have to hang on to the line to keep the boat at that position. Then I imagine the shore crew would move the line over about 6' and then the process would start again?

That is a twist on how we did it. We had 2 ropes, one on front/one on the back of the boat and the shore crew moved the boat both forward and backward in the current lane of product being applied and then also moved the boat over to the next lane as needed. Our way requires more rope as each rope has to be the full width of the pond. Your way requires one rope, but requires a person in the boat to maneuver the boat.

I'd be curious how your method worked out for you?

Good to hear a spot has dried out. IIRC you used only half of 1 unit, so you have more polymer on hand. Identifying origins of leaks is tricky, that's why Aquaben recommends treating ENTIRE ponds and not spot treatment. I prefer to start smaller and expand as necessary...significantly cheaper that way. Why blow thousands when a single unit might work? Have to at least try the cheapest route first, in my mind. Let me know how I can help, Dave. Here anytime.

CC, using one rope worked great if you weren't the one pulling on the rope. We had the rope so tight that it was a hard pull for that kid. Later we loosened it a little bit which didn't have any negative effects re boat control but sure made it easier to pull.

Dave, it sounds to me like the pond will do better now, in the drought years! 1" per week sounds good

Tracy

Here is some general tips we cam up with:

When pulling from the boat hook the lope thru a eyelet on the bow and aft of the boat or cable car method (pulley style).

All surfaces will get messy, so don't where designer jeans

Flag your area for reference in applying material and where you want to end up on each pass will be great assistance also. Tie rope(s) off to 4 wheelers etc.

Use a scale to weigh a solo cup of material and then put into scoop. Mark the area for future reference. That way we took the guessing game out of the equation. KISS method.

When wind is not a factor the scoop and shake method works pretty well, but be deliberate in spreading when wind is present-throw it at the water surface.

Have a great 3 buckets labeled (A,B, Bentonite)-sing a song while applying-keeps it all together.

Then have a guy or gal on shore yelling stroke when its time to pull the boat.

Dave if theres more chime in here.

It's hard to wash off your hands, off of tools, out of buckets, and out of clothes. If you leave residue anywhere, and it dries, it will make a mess again when it is re-wet. If it wasn't messy, it would not work so well. Not a complaint.

1" weekly - wow, hope that's good news for you. Congrats Dave, certainly sounds manageable, but hoping you can find and treat the source of the additional leak. I'm glad for the partial resolution, considering you used only 1/2 unit of polymer I'm relieved with the results. I hope you are, too. Let me know how I can help.

I have photo's of when the dam was built. It is no more than a stopped up gully(called a draw in Texas). So, I can guesstimate the area that isn't natural ground. What I wonder about is how much sand has washed in to cover that area. Can that be a factor? Don't know.

I'll give it another week or so and then assemble the teens to hit it again.

Wishing I hadn't sold my diving gear about 30 years ago.

All the stuff that got the slicked up was covered in dirt/sand to become a crust which we could later scrap off and make clean.

Would a power washer work??

I left my ropes and oars on shore, in a couple weeks it had all dried up and flaked off. No big deal. I don't know how someone would get the hydrated polymer on one's clothing or on tools, but again imagine it would dry up and flake off like it did on my oars and ropes. Remember, the polymer is designed to be applied to the pond, not the applicator.

If applying dye has any similarities, I don't know if I could lay outside long enough for it to dry up and flake off.....

For some reason a mental image of a speedo and Bob-O popped into my head. Shutter, my day is ruined!

Sure you could Scott. Just make a road trip down here in August to do it. I bet you dry up PDQ.

Maybe not if you haven't found that voodoo doll yet!

Polymer goes in dry form, unless someone literally jumps into the pond, I don't see how it could possibly get on one's clothes or tools...unless they tip the boat? I guess anything is possible, but figured I'd have made the mistake already if there was one to make. Historically that's how it tends to go.

I guess I am sloppy. Wore rubber gloves and rubber boots, but got it on my boots and gloves, and from there on my sleeves. When you get a little on the bank at the waterline, you tend to slide into the pond. It came out in the wash, but stopped up the sewer in the process. NOT!

Just saying...

Thanks for setting the bar guys! Finally it's not me.

In my pond I have a leak from the pond to the creek blue line in photo. I believe the leak was caused by some mulberry tree roots that were growing along the creek bank. Mull berrys have been taken care of. Would the Soilfloc work in this case.

How many units does it take to treat a 1 acre pond? I thought about treating mine when the pond is half full thus only needing 1/2 the material. If the water level doesn't stabilize till the pond is around 1/4 full then why treat the entire pond? I've read this is an all or nothing treatment for best results but that doesn't make sense to apply over the whole basin if the leak is in the bottom half.

Hi Yak

If trees have been removed, yes Soilfloc can be applied to seal the fissures created by the roots. I'll send a PM.

Hi Archer

Depending on the rate of leak, it varies from 11-13 units. I'll send a PM and we can connect and discuss.

Scott,

Not sure about pressure washer. No electricity near us when we were done. Tons of sand though.

Joshua

A couple of thoughts on Soilfloc I learned from use:

1) You can use a leaf blower to blow the "goo" back into the pond if the wind comes up and it drifts to shore - then hopefully it will sink before it blows back to shore.

2) The coarse grind recommended by Aquaben (after the regular failed to produce any noticeable results) was a disaster. I have posted 3 pictures below - the first shows what the product looks like when it fails to sink and is scooped up in a aquarium net - the second shows the product ( A and B mixed prior to application) still floating after 3 days - and the third is product being piled up on shore after being netted out of the pond (one of many piles) - this was after 5 days. 20 fish lost due to the application. And yes- I got a refund from them.

I wanted to add a little note here. TJ spent a lot of time with me on the phone discussing Soilfloc prior to my purchase - unfortunately when I was ready to order, he was out of town and I wanted to get it applied ASAP as my pond was dropping faster than the stock market during the last crash. So I ordered directly from Aquaben and worked with Sandra. This did not stop TJ from continuing to take time to advise me as I struggled to get some results with this product - including the "coarse grind" fiasco. Not many people would do that - so I just wanted to personally thank TJ for all of the help he gave me and for the time he is spending to work with other Pond Boss members.

Wayne, you're welcome, and I'm glad you saw some resolution eventually.

It sounds like the course grind was a no go.

In my experience [which is limited], yes, the course grind has been an issue. I no longer recommend it.

Could you explain the failure of the regular grain? What size is your pond, how much water was it losing per week and much product did you use?

I am not aware of any issues thus far using the normal, fine grind crosslink polymer blend, but am aware of 3 failed projects using the course grind. The course grind never wanted to sink, apparently, and as a result blew all over the pond and against the shoreline. While the leaks were not improved, at least the customers were taken care of by the manufacturer.

I recently treated my sediment pond with Soilfloc. This little pond would fill up really quick from a rain and then it would drop a foot in just a very short time, maybe 8 hrs or so. Tj set me up with an order and we discussed treatment. I added two to four oz's of sk A and then added the same of sk B. Threw out A and then threw out B. I did this by standing along the shore line and threw it out over the water along the shore. I used a med sized drinking cup that my drink came in from a local drive in restaurant. It was the waxy type cup. I cut out a portion of the cup to where it would act like a scoop. I cut the cup to hold 4 oz. The treatment worked and for the last week the little pond(30x30x8) is now holding water with little to no seepage.

TOO EASY

Thanks Tj, ck is in the mail

Tracy

Tracy, that's great. With so many "it depends" when dealing with ponds, it must be nice to have done something that just plan worked.

Yes it is Al, it seems to have worked really well. The only problem I had was after the application, My footing was slippery to where my feet got wet as I slid into the pond. it just made it a little harder to do but again it was just Too Easy

Tracy

Tracy that's great news and I'm happy to have helped! When I first applied I had no clue how slippery hydrated polymer could become and almost knocked out my teeth on the gunwale of the boat. Even a little spilled polymer in the bottom of a leaky boat is a recipe for a hazard.

He stated the regular failed to produce any noticeable results. What was the reason for that outcome?

I just caught that. He worked directly with Aquaben on the project so I don't know what he ordered, when, how much, how applied, etc. - only some general ideas. A PM to him would probably help fill in the gaps, though, unless Wayne pops back on and can walk us through the scenario.

It sounds to me like the coarse grain needs something like pre-added clay, dust, concrete, etc. into the material itself to make it more dense than water, and carry in permanent plugging substances. It likely gets air trapped in the grains and wont sink.

That stuff looks exactly like the material gardeners add to hanging flower arrangement soils to cut the amount of watering necessary. It is hard to make it sink.

What is cool is my son and I picked up a set of guns that use polymer balls a little larger than Airsoft pellets when "inflated" with water. They show up in little packets of 1000 balls about the size of a pin head. Let them soak in water, and they are about 1/4 inch in diameter. This is about 20x or more size increase! Boy are they fun to mess with! They are all over the sidewalk outside now. When it is dry out, you don't see the bullets since they shrink back down. Once it rains or have heavy dew, all of a sudden there are bullets everywhere!

Good points, Squid - we've never tried another coarse grind experiment to determine if sodium bentonite would encourage it to sink and not drift. I am recommending bentonite application to all customers now just as added insurance, however, to put all the odds in our favor possible for successful treatment of seepage. So far, so good.

Archer82 -

To answer your questions: Pond is approximately .66 of an acre and is 11' deep in the deep end when full. It is a dug and dammed pond. The leak was occurring along a 200' section of one end of the pond. the higher the level in the pond - the more it leaked. Aquaben recommended treating that area - which was about 1/3 of the total pond surface area. I used one unit of A and one unit of B applied 1/2 unit at a time - 7 days apart. Before treating, I was advised to drag the bottom of the pond to stir up the mud before applying the Soilfloc so that it could carry the mud to the leak areas. Since there was a small amount of stringy weed on the bottom of the pond, I killed that first with Cutrine to make sure the weed would not inhibit the ability of the product to work. Was applied on a windless day with an aluminum boat and a small electric trolling motor working one end (50' wide) and working backwards till complete. You must do this when there is absolutely no wind.

When this showed no sign of slowing the leak, the coarse grind was recommended - and you can read in my earlier post what the result of that was. Hope this helps explain.

5 years later, a lot of money, and still leaks, I can post a few more pictures to show the history of this pond, we received 6 inches of rain just a few weeks ago and I've already lost 3 feet of it as of 6-30, this pond has frustrated me to no end.

Jimmy

This was taken April 2009, we were putting down a 12" layer of good clay from a nearby clay pit, prior to this it leaked about 6" a day.

After we finished spreading the layer of clay, Bentonite was spread over the bottom and sides.

Even with the clay layer and Bentonite, the pond leaked at least an inch a day maybe more, I ended up pushing the clay/Bentonite layer on the bottom all around the sides to expose the original bottom which was mostly sand, I did this after I took core samples and found clay 4 to six feet under the sand, for different reasons, I wasn't able to start removing the sand until recently, In this picture, I'm just getting started.

Jim, welcome to the forum. Get rid of the sand, excavate the clay and stockpile it.

Make the pond into the shape that you want, but make it 18"-24" bigger and deeper. Bring that clay back in, with proper moisture so you can roll it in your hands and make "pencils" or a hair wetter if it's really dry out.

Spread it out about 6"-8" deep. Run over it with a sheepsfoot roller until the roller starts to "walk out" on top of the clay. Repeat with another layer. Do that 3-4 times from bottom to past high water level in the pond and it should hold water like a bathtub with the drain closed (not open). Good clay, correct moisture for compaction and proper compaction are the keys to having a pond that holds water.

Layers thicker than that and the bottom of the layer won't compact, and the layers won't "knit" together. They will be like sheets of paper in a book. Tracked construction equipment is designed to lessen the psi on the ground, so the equipment doesn't sink. So, they are poor soil compactors. You could use a multi-tired pan scraper that is filled with dirt to get weight. Make many, many passes to compact ALL the clay. But, a sheepsfoot is what I'd use.

I can't imagine applying Alum, Hydrated Lime, or soil floc without it getting all over me. Any breeze/dust, add sweat, and I'm a mess! Maybe you don't sweat enough when applying it, TJ

I've never seen TJ break a sweat!!!

Going to try and spread out the two bags I have of soilfloc on Saturday. Need to buy a bunch of rope to set up the grids. Also need to get a few bags of bentonite to throw down also.
My pond was down over four feet when I was there last weekend. Still dropping. I marked the water lines at that level, and am planning on applying it from those lines, deeper.
We have had big rains yesterday and today, so I may be back up a foot or two, which might help with the hydraulic pressure to get the soilfloc in to the leaks. I've dove down to the bottom in most of the pond. Not finding much leaf debris, or FA. (Still 10' deep) so I'm hoping to get the soilfloc to where it needs to be.
I've got a leak somewhere, it's certainly not severe, but it concerns me non the less. I'd like a little bit more stable water line if possible.

Jeff

Setterguy, rope grids are not needed in my opinion. The soilfloc floats on the surface and spreads around a bit on its own (even a light puff of wind will cause it to move around). Thus even if you put it in perfect 'lanes' it will move around on the way down.

I found that if applying from a boat that a 6' width was good. About 3' of that was you in the boat and the other 3' was the area of untreated water in front of you that you were throwing into. I marked 6' widths on the shore with a cheap paint can (any rattle can you have left over) Then I had 1 rope on front of boat and one rope on back of boat, each rope long enough to reach across entire pond. One person on each rope and slowly move boat across while I spread product. Then the shore folks move to the next mark on the bank and you start back across the other way.

This way I had an even 3' of open water to broadcast the powder in and with the powder moving slightly on a calm day you still ended up with a good overlap and good coverage. If you are worried you can always go back and retreat trouble areas with another 'coat'

I have a thread that gives much more (painful) detail if you care to read it.

canyoncreek, I'd like to see that thread. I'll try a search.
I will only have one other person up there (wife) so I'm not sure if we could get it rigged up to pull the boat across, and stay in line.
Did you throw out the back or side of the boat? Did you throw down bentonite also? I'm hoping that will help it sink more quickly.
I'm going to use 5 gal buckets for the two parts and bentonite. I haven't figured out how much to put in a cup, and how much surface area that will cover.
Also, did you turn boat around at each length completed, so that you were always throwing out the back of the boat, and not pulling the boat through the thrown polymer?
Lots of questions. I've only got one bag of each, hoping for a decent result with least amount of $$$$..
Saturday forecast is clear with 87 degrees, and a 4 mph wind out of the north. That's as good as I'm going to get. The pond is completely surrounded by tall trees, so it doesn't get much wind anyway.
Thanks
Jeff

My pond is only 100' across, 200' long. I did back/forth on the short axis with 100 foot ropes on front and back of boat. I sat sideways in the rowboat with 5 gallon buckets in front of me. I had a white bucket for A and colored/dark bucket for part B. The boat didn't turn around, the shore team just slide me down the pond another 6' or so and then back across. They slid me from the treated to the untreated so the product on the water was always under or behind me (as I faced the untreated water) Pictures in this thread will help:

SoilFloc tutorial

If you have only one person and it isn't too windy then another idea is to drive a stout stake into the ground on each side and run a rope between stakes. Then your wife can be in the boat and hand over hand move the boat along the rope and then at the other side, get out, move the boat about 6-8 feet over restake and do again.

Or if there are lots of trees, just anchor to a tree on each side. You could also cable clamp a section of pvc pipe to the boat and let the guide rope go through the pvc to keep you on track.

Don't get too stressed, many have just used a trolling motor to move around. Some overlap doesn't hurt and you will be able to see by the plume on top of the water where the product is.

If you are treating the whole pond then some idea of keeping boat on a grid helps to use limited product to the best potential by even distribution. If you are focusing on a certain area where the leak is then you can just spot treat there with a trolling motor.

I didn't use bentonite. The theory behind bentonite is to give more particles in the water, more mass for the polymer to grab on to and drive down into the leaks at the bottom. My water was clear and the bottom absent vegetation, I think my part A and part B of the soilfloc found its way down just fine.

You are supposed to throw cup fulls of the product into the water. I chose to use a hand crank grass seed spreader. I took a half cup measuring cup and took 1/2 cup of part A and put in the spreader hopper, then 1/2 cup B and then 1/2 cup A and 1/2 cup B using even ratio/layers of A and B till the hopper was full. Then as boat was moving, I steadily turned the crank which mixed product and spread it in a nice even mist on the water. I feel this gives a good even coating but the factory specs say a clump tossed in of A followed by a clump of B roughly in the same area is just as good. I think our coverage looks better as you see an even film. This film spreads out a bit before it sinks and with each lane of the boat overlapping a bit I think we had good coverage.

The 2 units that I did roughly covered more than my 1/4 acre so I ended up going back with the extra and almost recovered the whole area again.

I'm losing water again but our ground water is low, drought conditions here and high heat and high evaporation. I have pumped it up a few times already. However, when I drive sticks into the bottom you can clearly feel a hard skin give way as the stick is going through the congealed soilfloc layer then hits the sand below it.

When we hit full pool after the next big rain, I hope to apply the little I have left in buckets in my basement just for good measure.

Hope that helps.

It does. Thanks!

Quick update. We got the soilfloc down. Clean up is worse than the application process.
I didn't take any pics. My wife and mother in law manned the ropes and pulled me back and forth in 6' swaths. I spray painted the 6' markings along the pond edge.
Started out with no air movement, but about half way through a bit of a west wind kicked in. So, we have some soilfloc piled up against the east bank. We had 4.5" of rain in the last few weeks. We got a 3" bump from the first 3" of rain that came over a 36 hr period.
Then we had a 1.5" rain that came down in an hour. We got about 8" rise from that. I'll measure the water drop and see if thenleak slows down. I had lost about 4.5' of water since Jan first. We had a 3" rain in May, that was the only moisture we had except a few easy <.5" showers.
Hoping I don't see any fish killed.

SetterGuy, Great to hear that you made the polymer go to work for you. You are right, you can't clean that stuff up, water only makes it harder to work with. We ended up leaving a pile of goo on the bank of our pond from trying to hose it out of the boat. That slippery spot stayed slippery for months and more than one person almost hit it and ended up in the pond.

So was the leak near the east end where the product piled up? Or you weren't sure? You said you had 2 units, did it cover the pond adequately?

Did you toss in a cup or use a spreader or what worked best for you?

I doubt you will have a fish kill as the ruckus of the boat going back and forth usually sends the fish away.

Keep us posted. You will love the clear water that you will have for the next week or so (providing it doesn't rain)

I really think 90% sank pretty quickly. The leak, I suspect, is near the base of the dam, which is on the north end of the pond. I coated it pretty heavily.
I just had one unit, one each of parts A and B. I should try to actually measure off the area I covered, but the pond width varies so much, it would be a pain to calculate sq ft.
I had two 50# bags of bentonite. I threw it down with every shift of the boat. I used a small handheld spreader for the actual distribution of the soilfloc.
Went back down to the pond late yesterday. There was still a small film on the surface on the east side, as the wind stayed out of the west. A few small white clumps floating around but few and far between. It was hot so I jumped in. I didn't swim into anything.
Fish all seem fine. The feeder is in the south east corner. I threw out a few handfuls of feed, and had a lot of feeding, even though it was still early. The HBG were feeding on me when I was swimming/floating. I wish I'd never have put those buggers in there.
I did take one pic, before I got in the boat. After that I, and the two ladies, were covered with soilfloc, and there was no chance for pics. I had the two parts of soilfloc behind me in the boat, and rotated around to fill the spreader. The bentonite was at my feet in another five gallon bucket. They pulled me back and forth in 6' sections. There was some current stirred up by the boat, when I was being pulled with the stern first. (Me sitting in the stern.) When pulled bow first, I was in the back and there was no current, and I felt like the soilfloc was going down smoother. It is a VERY small rowboat, bought very cheap on eBay. It barely holds me (240#), and the three buckets of material. I had about 1" of freeboard on the stern. The benefit of that was that the spreader was about 6" off the water when I was cranking the handle.
My set up: now that I see the picture, I notice I shifted the buckets around after I took it. The two soilfloc buckets went in the middle, and the bentonite bucket went in the stern.

Notice the water level is down 4'. It was worse until recent rains. We have been in a pretty serious draught up here until last weekend. The leak is probably half the water loss, evaporation accounts for the rest.

Just finished up adding 4 1/2 units of Soilfloc that I ordered two weeks ago. Thanks to the forum members for their posts and advice that I have tried to follow the last several months in making up my mind on what to do. I have a 1/2 acre pond approximately 13' deep that was constructed 15 years ago in Central Illinois. The top 8" or so of the original soil was sandy loam, but anything below that was what we call blow sand, just like a beach. When the pond was constructed, it was lined with local clay, although it did contain some rocks. Bentonite was also mixed in. The pond never filled adequately and then a 84' deep well was drilled nearby to supply water (water table 40' down). This filled up the pond within a matter of weeks. As long as I had the well running continuously (1 1/2 hp pump), the pond stayed full and would even go over the outlet pipe. However, I got tired of spending over $100 a month just on electric usage for the well. After I decided it was enough, the pond dropped considerably over a matter of weeks until it finally stabilized with just about 4 feet of water. Two months ago I pumped the water down to about 2 feet deep (since the water line seemed to stabilize at the 4' mark). I then had the original contractor come back in and re-work the pond (without bentonite. When it was originally constructed, he just used a backhoe and a D-6, then ran a box scraper over it. 15 years later ha had huge JD Tractor (probably 200K new) with an implement on the back that had 4 huge tires of probably 1 ton each used to compact the soil. After he was done I began pumping water in again and only took 17 days from 2 foot of water to 13' on a 1/2 acre pond. I shut the water off last week to see if it would stay, and dropped about 4 inches in 3 days. Not too bad, but would like better. I then cranked up the well again and filled it back up as far as possible to make sure I got as much head pressure for the Soilfloc to work. We put part A and part B each in 5 gallon buckets and drove around the edges with a golf cart and applied with a 2 cup measuring cup throwing it out as far as we could get. Then took the small boat out with enough rope to stretch across the pond. A person on each end of the rope, opposite from the pond, pulled the rope back and forth. Rather than going back and forth across the pond and wanting to make sure we had enough Soilfloc, we actually did a circular pattern around the pond and working ourselves inward. That way if I did run out of the material, it would be in the center of the pond where it was obviously the deepest and the location of where it seemed to hold water. There is no wind, but after 2 hours the SoilFloc that is still on the surface seems to go to the southern 1/3 of the pond, which is the side against the dam. Maybe this is a sign it is getting drawn to a leak, I don't know. But am keeping my fingers crossed it will work!

I'm hoping I put mine down heavy enough. After reading your post bjm83, I'm thinking I may have tried to cover too large of an area with one unit. I marked the current water level on a 2x2 before I left earlier today. I'll see how it is next weekend.

This last June, I applied soilfloc to a � acre pond. Our decision to use Soilfloc was because of the logistics of draining the pond.

Applying 3 units of Soilfloc was prescribed to treat � acre of the pond, targeted area was near the dam.

I roped my father in-law into helping me, mainly manning the ropes we strung across the pond. We used ropes approximately 3� apart to help with determining square footage for treatment.

The application process went smoothly. I used my small pontoon boat as guide for length and our ropes as width.

After treating, I started noticing the difference in water clarity and in 2 days our seepage area started slowing down. On July 3rd, I put in a measuring stick to determine success. I found that my water loss was mainly evaporation and not due to seepage. The area on backside of dam is dry as a bone and we have more water this year than last year.

I am impressed with the product and support I received from TJ.

Josh your application rate seemed spot on and I imagine you went more heavy at the base of the dam since you knew you had seepage there. I also bought 3 units but my pond was perhaps 1/4 acre instead of your 1/2 acre. I probably could have gotten by with 1.5 units or even 2. I ended up putting in 2 units but had to go and retreat pretty much the whole pond to use up the entire 2nd unit. I intend to retreat the remaining 1 unit for 'good measure' when I get a nice calm day.

Great to know it worked so well for you.

Keep us updated SetterGuy

Update. No way to tell if it's working. We had 1 1/2" rain. Pond came up 4". Had some runoff, but not a lot. Marked everything again, pond is down 33 7/8" from full pool.
Have rain in the FC again on Sunday. After that it's 10 dry days with 90+ degree temps. Hopefully then, I'll be able to see if it's working.

I did go little heavy near the sections i determined the seepage to be at, but I will finish up my treatment later this year. The water level has only dropped mainly to evaporation. Its been a great sight to see at this pond. Last year it was 2-3' lower.

Just an update on my Soilfloc treatment on 7/9. I am very pleased at the results so far. After one week with no rain, my water depth only dropped 1" and I suspect that was due to evaporation. I turned on my 1.5 hp well over night and between that and a 1" rain it brought the pond back up to the highest it's ever been. One thing I noticed is that around the edges of the pond (where I seemed to apply more of the product), actual soil particles seemed to be very noticeable. Before treatment, you could see the hardpan of the bottom and track marks from the compaction equipment. After treatment, you could really tell that soil particles were brought down and settled on the bottom. That leads me to believe the Soilfloc is working by drawing any suspended particles in the water down to the bottom to fill any voids and cracks. Oh and I have to throw this out there as others have said as well....it's very slick! My neighbor informed me yesterday he went down the other day to take a look at the pond. He was standing on top of the outflow pipe that must have had some Soilfloc in it, and sure enough he slipped and went face first in the water!

I see everyone talking about "units". Everything I see online is in lbs. How many pounds is a unit? What is the price of a unit? Where are you purchasing at?

Thanks guys!

Hi Peach:

I can offer Pond Boss family a discount making it the cheapest available, below wholesale direct from the manufacturer. Happy to assist in any way I can, feel free to ping me via PM or email I can address all your questions.

TJ

tj@hudlandmgmt.com

A unit is two 55 pound bags; one each of A and B. A half unit (smallest available) is two 27.5 pound, 5 gallon pails, one each of parts A and B.

Well, according to climate.com I received another 2-3" of rain last night, and it went through very quickly. I suspect the pond received a lot of runoff. I'll go up tomorrow to check, but won't really be able to tell if the soilfloc treatment has done anything.
But I do LOVE finally getting some RAIN!!

Have you been measuring your daily water loss prior to this rain? Any changes from before treatment? Wet spots that have dried up?

TJ, I seriously hope I am one of soilfloc's most dramatic success stories. I'm just having a bit of a difficult time proving it. I was down 4' when I got ready to treat. Then it came up 6" right before I treated. Then it came up another 6" after that. No telling how far it will come up this time. And, of course each rain has different runoff characteristics, so just taking a look at what's in the rain gauge won't help either.
I'll know in the morning, what the level is. I'll mark it, and start over.
The truth is, I needed rain so bad, I'm really pleased to get every drop. It just isn't helping the science of measuring soilfloc results..
I will see it tomorrow, and then won't see it again until Aug 3rd at the earliest.
Jeff

TJ,
Update. We had 2"+ rain earlier this week. My rain gauge is showing 4" for the month.
It brought the water up another foot. So, now I'm up 18" from when I treated the pond. I'm up 2' from the lowest point, before the draught ended.
I marked it at 24 1/4" below the bottom of the pipe.
I will be back up on Aug 3rd and get a measurement then. I don't get a lot of wind on the pond, but I do lose a fair amount of water to evaporation. Earlier I had a 5 gallon bucket of water sitting on the dam. It lost about 1/2" of water to every inch the pond dropped.
So my leak essentially doubled the evaporation rate.
I'm hoping the increased hydraulic pressure from this extra 2' of water will help force the soilfloc into the leak..

It is ironic that we spent our money for SoilFloc on a trip to Disney, and are now in the midst of a serious drought. Every time rain is in the forecast for days... the day gets here and nothing happens. The good news is my leak has slowed and I am only down 13 inches after three months of only 2.5 inches of rain. Still, I can't help but think that a treatment would have saved me several inches of water and allowed me to finally mow the dam backside swamp.

I wish I would have only been down 13". Our drought went from Jan 1 to mid May, with maybe an inch of moisture, and I was down 4'!
This crazy heat appears to be bringing in some severe thunderstorms. We were supposed to be dry for the next 10 days, but I see a orange/yellow storm passing over the farm now. Those heavy downpours don't help my farmer neighbors up there, but they do add water to the pond.
I hope your drought ends soon. But I wouldn't wish this 99 degree weather with high humidity on anyone.

I'm right in the midst of the orange stuff in Western NY.
http://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/Home/RegionalDroughtMonitor.aspx?northeast
The Niagara Penninsula has it the worst though. Huge river running through it, not a drop since mid-May.

SetterGuy,
From the look of the radar image, you may be near full pool sometime today.

John F...how's the radar look for us in SW Arkansas?? lol. Nevermind. Hoping we get a break soon. You guys in the NW got a pretty good rain earlier in the week didnt you? I know west central got a pretty good one. It was well north of us.

Bear in mind evaporation rates for a bucket and a pond are not equal, rates for a pond will be higher. There's no hard rule as it depends on many variables of the pond, just keep that in mind when comparing pond evaporation vs. bucket rates. What was your daily water loss prior to treatment?

Like TJ said...I see alot more evap on windy days than still days...we have had alot of hot windy days lately also... We live on a hill so wind is a big variable for me.

I'm going to just make a simple gauge. Going to get an ice cream bucket and a 2x4 and the first 3 feet of a tape measure, screw the 3ft section of tape measure on to the 3 1/2" side of the 2x4 (I have sooo many old tapes laying around that won't suck all the way in but I don't want to throw away...lol), screw the 2x4 to the ice cream bucket, fill with gravel and set it in the water. It doesn't take a long piece of tape or deep water to check water loss...I'm going to use 36". Set it in water around 28" to start with. From there begin a log...once it gets to low for that I will move it, and reset my starting point.

If you don't have an old tape, you can get them in the $2.99 box in the front of any parts store.

Just a thought, what I'm going to do.

I encourage everyone I help to measure daily vertical water loss to help determine application rates of polymer. Accelerated leaks require heavier application. Further, it's important to establish baseline data to compare against following treatment to verify degree of application success.

We got 1.85 inches of rain on Friday, the 15th. That's the last measurable rainfall we have received. It was enough to make our small creek run, and I was able to extend the rain by pumping some of it from the creek to my pond. The pond came up 18" total. It is now down almost 6 inches from that high level.

Bear in mind evaporation rates for a bucket and a pond are not equal, rates for a pond will be higher. There's no hard rule as it depends on many variables of the pond, just keep that in mind when comparing pond evaporation vs. bucket rates. What was your daily water loss prior to treatment? [/quote]
TJ
I kept records all during the draught from Jan to May. I'm traveling and don't have that info with me. Good to know about the different evaporation rates. I guess that would mean my leak is not as bad as I thought. I do get very little wind on the pond, as its surrounded by trees.
I won't see the pond for a week and a half, so no data for a while. We did get 2-3" more rain yesterday. So, if anything, soilfloc is an excellent method to end a draught. I imagine my rain guage is overflowing at this point. I don't recall reading that on the label, maybe they should change the label to "rain maker!"

Update. More rain since I got my last measurements. I went by yesterday, and the pond was only down 14". (It was down 4' at one time due to draught and leak.)
I am going back up this weekend, and was going to see if there was a drop in the water level. However, I see we are getting more rain this morning. Who knows, I might get back to full pool at this rate. It would appear that soilfloc will definitely bring in rain. It's worth the investment for that reason alone. (Just kidding..)

The good news so far, is that I went down behind the dam yesterday. There is no moving water in the old ditch bed. It used to have a trickle current when the pond was at this level. There was some very orange (algae) water standing in the ditch bed, but it was not moving. I'm pretty sure it came in off the back of the dam, and the hillsides from the last rain. So, I'm thinking that the soilfloc has helped, but I can't get a measurement that means anything until the rain lets up.

Back up at the pond. Three days later. It's almost full. We've had another 2.5" of rain and the pond is up another 6". I think I'm still getting some inflow seepage out of the woods, or I would measure the level. We have more rain coming, so I still won't see a drop in the water level. It's a great problem to have (not being able to measure a water level drop)
I still give soilfloc all the credit. It's a draught buster!
Going to move my feeder back a foot or so. It's almost under water.

Update.. We were at the pond all weekend. The water is perfect for swimming. Measured the waterline at 3:00 on sat and sun. Had a 1/4" drop from day to day. The last significant rainfall (2") was Thursday. Not sure if I was still getting and below ground water seeping "into" the pond.
That is a pretty significant improvement in water loss. Too early to tell. I'll be back up Wednesday and check again. If I have a 1/4" per day water loss, I'll be a very happy camper.
Yesterday morning..

Hey man congrats!! Hope that level of fall continues and doesn't get any larger. I think I'm closer 1/2-3/4 per day. I have no water coming in except rain. On a windy hill, two trees around whole thing, 95-100 degree days. Probably to be expected...but would LOVE to be in the 1/4" range!!

Thanks. If it stays at this drop rate, I'll be sleeping so much better.

I may have spoke (or written) too soon. Back at the pond. It's down a little over an inch in three days. I believe that's still a slower leak than what I had, but would still equate to almost a foot per month. After our five month draught this winter and spring, I was down 4'. Not sure I can put my pond in the "success" column.

Hi Jeff

Whats your evaporation rate? What was your starting daily loss? You're looking at .33" daily currently, in Lincoln last two days it's been about .25" daily [hot and windy], so 80% of the loss would be due to evaporation [at least here in Lincoln], so you might be better off than you think. I sure hope so!

In my mind, there's very little difference between evaporation and leaking - one goes up, the other goes down - all ponds lose water over time between irrigation or rains. For me it's about reducing water loss to an manageable/acceptable standard. 3" weekly is the goal of many people - I work with folks losing 12" weekly or more. Every scenario is different, obviously.

IIRC you spot treated in area you suspected a leak, and that's the most cost effective way to approach a leak issue and encourage everyone to try and save money and use the sniper approach. However, one of the risks of spot treatment is you may treat some of the leaks, but potentially more exist in areas left untreated. In the end, a guy can live with the results or consider retreatment - at least there's a choice and no one has broken the bank yet. I always ensure to convey this to everyone - re application may be necessary to achieve desired results, and even then it may not happen. In 90%+ cases we've seen at least a 50% reduction in water loss - so historically speaking the odds are in our favor, but it's not an exact science by any means. Plenty of variables - and I'm still learning more daily. In the cases where it failed, I still have zero clue on what the heck happened.

Losing .33" daily in mid August doesn't seem too bad to me - but all depends on previous daily loss data and your personal expectations. Here to help any way I can.

Hello Pond boss friends. I have been on here for a few years mainly reading and trying to catch up. This will be the first big story then I will follow up with questions in the different sub groups. I had become a member on here a few years ago when my pond was new and had sense lost my username and password stuff so I rejoined so to speak.
Like many stories I started my pond project without the great aid of this forum as I didn�t find it till after our pond was dug. As digging my contractor found somewhat of a gravel vein so to speak so we had to dig below that for the core and dam, this ended up making the dam end (deep end) 18 feet deep with steep sides. The rain started and the money got short due to the extra digging so we stopped hoping the water would fill the dam end and �backwater� into the shallow areas knowing if it did that we could always dig and pack this end in the future. There are acres of runoff so the pond filled with a size between � acre and 1 acre. (closer to the �). Then the water level dropped. This went on for about 5 years and would always stop leaking at around a 6 foot depth. It was up and down. As you can imagine it was a sickening eyesore so to speak. Last year I rented a giant pump and drained it with the understanding a guy was going to start bringing in better clay to reline it and as is sometimes common after a month it rained again and was so I couldn�t do anything.
During the years I had measured a consistent daily drop of 7 inches so it was huge. The pond would drain in days. I started researching the soilfloc and decided as a last ditch effort I would try it. I was very skeptical as most are since there is not any typical magic powder for ponds. My plan was to wait till it rained and got the deep end filled this is about 1/3 of an acre and 12 feet deep. It was calculated I should use 3 units for this area.
I purchased this and sat it at the ready knowing rain was possible. July 4th I woke up to an almost full pond again, fuller than I had planned for. I was going to wait for it to drop some to the smaller plan but my wife repeated what I had told her that it was a gamble and lets just do it. She convinced me to start. We concentrated 1 unit over the deep end we knew the leak was in this area since it always drained down to that level. The wind picked up and we called it quits with only 1 of the 3 units in.
We put a stake in the ground to measure from expecting like last time I would need to move it about every day. I took diligent notes. The first day we lost 3 inches of water. I then waded out and put a more permanent stake in the next day. In 12 hours we lost 1 inch. It had stabilized to around 2 inches for a few days. We are not a month and a few days into it and I am now losing an average of 1 inch per day. Ok so that is still a loss, I know evaporation is around � to 1/3 inch per day. We have had more rain so it has come up and down and I have taken all that into account with starting over on measurements after the rain. I still have the other 2 units to apply and will soon.
Long long story short I am thrilled. I never imagined the pond would stay at the level it is. I know my long story is not the normal from this use but this stuff worked on my situation. I was probably lucky in some ways. I don�t know where the leak is at now. It has stayed up so it could still be in the deep end or also in part the other end as it has never held water for this length up there. I now have weeds and had a bloom right away that my other posts will cover plus aeration.
Thanks for reading.
A happy pond owner.
Dave

Thanks for sharing, Dave. Glad to hear your expectations were exceeded. Next time contact me for a Pond Boss family discount and save a little money!

My losses were 5.7 inches in the past week. I still have a leak somewhere, but don't see wet spots anywhere near the pond. I think evaporation has been less than 1/4 inch per day. My minnow pond right next to the main pond has lost about an inch and a quarter. All I can tell the Soilfloc did for my pond was stop one seep through the dam where I knew it wasn't compacted well. I applied it on that spot very heavily, about three times the recommended rate. But, that was actually a small seep, volume wise. My daily losses are still about 80% of initial losses. It's cheaper for me to pump periodically than to buy something that might or might not work. At least, with leaking and pumping, I am getting new, clear, water in and nutrient laden water out.

Been crunching numbers since I saw your post. Over the last four days I have dropped 1 3/8". I am not sure about my evaporation rate. My pond is not exactly straight east of Lincoln, a bit south. I think I can assume it would be similar to your 1/4" evaporation rate per day. If so, I'm really not doing too bad. The total loss is .34" per day. That is 10.3" per month. Which is certainly a slower leak rate than before treatment. If we go through another four month time period without rain, I'll be better off than the last four month long draught.
I did only spot treat, so I cannot expect a 100% seal. My apologies, if I appeared too negative. I was pretty pumped when I only lost 1/4" that first day.
FYI, we are supposed to get some rain tomorrow. Then cooler weather. The good news is, my SMB are fat and happy.



Difference between .33" and .25" is .08" - I think this could very easily be due to evaporation - if not triple that number.

Beautiful SMB.

To evaluate the true value of a polymer treatment, I encourage one to compare the costs of polymer treatment vs other leak reduction methods. Compaction often results in losing entire fishery to drain and move in equipment and the project can exceed the original pond construction costs - $10 - $20k or more. Even with compaction, there's no guarantee the leak[s] will be addressed. Ask me about it sometime, I know this lesson well.

A liner is likewise not only invasive and requires draining the pond/losing fishery, but even more costly when one includes professional installation I think it's $2/sq ft or more. 1/2 acre pond would run $40k+.

Or, one can take a chance on a polymer treatment which costs around $80/1,000 sq ft. EIGHTY dollars. When a polymer treatment improves seepage rate, even fractionally, it's a huge win compared to the alternative treatment methods. In the end, a pond owner is literally several thousand dollars ahead, not to mention they get to preserve their fishery and keep all their water and not have to start over from scratch. Oh, and the application can typically be completed in a few hours as opposed to weeks or months of planning, draining, seining, etc. Important to keep those numbers and details in mind when evaluating the efficacy and true value of the polymer treatment.

Even so, I can pump a lot of water for $880.00. I bought the inexpensive 2 inch HF pump for initial filling and maintenance, so I would have it anyway. Many ponds around here leak for a year or so, then gradually seal as the clay settles, as rollers are not typically available, and bulldozer compaction takes a while to settle. I will re-evaluate before next summer. Still, the gradual water changes from periodic pumping improve quality and clarity.

Good point John - unfortunately many are reliant on natural precipitation as their sole source of irrigation, wells or pumping water are not options for them.

Pumping from other water sources of course means one is risking introduction of invasive species of organisms (fish, plants, etc). Basically anything in the water source can be introduced into ones pond. Something all should carefully consider prior to electing to do so.

That's great John. Of course I'm speaking generally for the benefit of the forum at large.

Update. Two more days without rain. Measured on the 15th, it had dropped 5/8", so I'm still doing ok. Just not getting any rain,, as usual.

Update.. Trying to compare year to year data on water loss. I was losing about .44" per day last summer. In the last 22 days I've been losing water at a .32" per day rate. Very little rain over the last three weeks. Mostly hot and dry. (1.5" rain in last 22 days.)
Jeff

SetterGuy,
That much difference in losses IMO could be due to normal "settling in" of a new pond. It may or may not be due to Soilfloc. My guess is it will gradually continue to get marginally better over time as mine has. Evaporation here for the past several weeks has been about 1/4 inch per day on sunny days. When nights are cool, and have lower dew points, the ponds with their warm waters will continue to lose moisture to the air during those nights, as long as the water surface temp is above the dew point, so I have seen some small evaporation losses at night.

BTW, we have had 0.9 inches of rainfall here since July 26 (40 days).

My pond is now down 24.25 inches from full (spillway) pool. It will take a lot of rain and pumping to get it back up the 20 or so inches to "normal" pool. The creek is down to a few deeper potholes.

This summer has been the wettest I have seen in many years here at my place in E Texas. My pond is down about a foot right now but many season past I ran the water well 24/7 and I would be down 2.5 foot. Last two years it flooded around here in the spring. But last year after the flooding we went from too much rain to June 1st and then had no rain till Oct. that's 120 days with out a drop of rain in the hottest part of the year. This year my soybean wildlife food plots are booming, I've never seen many soybeans. And I used some of Tj's product on my new settling pond because the bank were to steep to pac it down and so it leaked the top 8" and would lose that amount in just a day, now it will hold that amount for a week or so. It did not stop the leak 100% but it still did one heck of a job and I am more than happy with the results. Now if it could stop all the sand and dirt from entering this sediment pond things might be better. But the pond is doing what it is supposed to do, stopping all that from going into the big pond and reducing it depth and size. Oh well looks like I might have to dig it all out someday and start new. But for now the sediment pond is growing a lot of FHM's.

Tracy

John F,
I'm not sure, but I think the soilfloc is making a difference. My pond it a few years old, and has been up to full a few times. Either way, it's leaking slower than it was. Maybe someday I'll only have to worry about evaporation. Having looked at it for months, when it was 3 to 4 feet down, it looks a lot better.

Setter, I know what you mean...I tell people my pond is "going dry" and they think I'm crazy. But when you stare at that thing EVERYDAY, and know what you are seeing, its a little aggravating. I'm at about .5" a day...little less when cool. I'm not happy there...would love to slow it down...but like John says...maybe it will slowly seal a little more over time. Its not but a couple years since we worked it and its not gone dry since then. It did the couple years before we worked it. Its young...but isn't it great to see it full!

Absolutely!! Our pond is 15' deep, so even when it's down 4' I think my fish are still safe, but,, when it's down 4', it bothers the heck out of me. When we went by Saturday, and it was only down 19", (only) I was so relieved. Ha!
I didn't help myself building it in one of the driest counties in Missouri.

I know the feeling. We have had an especially hot and dry summer also. Worst drought in 50+ years, and it is not over. It is STILL hot, and that is creepy for us as about this time of year we normally make the transition from shorts to sweat shirts and pants.
I loose about 0.3" per day now when the pond is full, but amazingly I loose maybe 0.1" per day now that I am down about 2.5'. Now I know my leak is either up high on the back side of the dam, or the front. Since there is only one remaining wet spot on the back side, I think I know now... and it still bubbles with natural gas.

I am now at peace with my leak, if a 50+ year drought only drops me 2.5'

We are right in the base of the red "U" on the top squiggle in Western NY:
http://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/Home/StateDroughtMonitor.aspx?NY

I would be at peace with that also!

I'm going to be. (At peace with it.)
.3" per day will work for me. I'm certainly not going to drain it, and rework clay into the base of the pond etc.. (Enough invested already.)
If it slows down a bit more as time passes, great, but if it's .3" a day forever, I'll be fine with that..

My losses have dropped to under 0.4 inches per day. The drought index site says we need 7.34 inches of precipitation to end the current drought. It doesn't look like that's going to happen.

Update. Haven't been by the pond for nine days. Water level had dropped 2" exactly. Also had .5" in the rain gauge during that time. (Had a small rain shower on Friday 9/16)
So, 2.5" loss in nine days is .278" per day. My guess that's not too far off from evaporation rate. Still looking good, in my opinion. 40 miles south, they are getting lots of rain. We still ended up with good corn and bean harvests up here, so once our 5 month draught ended in June, my pond has been holding its own fairly well. Still down 19.75" from full, so some October/November storms will be welcome.

John...did you get any rain this past week?

Setterguy, thats great to hear! I may be looking into soilfloc as that would really be my best option. I'm still hanging around .5" a day...which isn't terrible...but still would love to get to where you are! Congrats again!

Got about 1.5 inches that raised the pond 2 inches. Not enough to make the creek run at all, so no pumping possible. Hoping for more rain, but none in forecasts. Losses are down to about 1/4 inch per day.

Well, it looks like I'm back to losing over .3" per day. I was last here at the farm on 9/19, then checked yesterday, 9/30. Eleven day period I lost 3.5". That's a per day average of .318".
The leak wasn't that much faster before the treatment. Possibly because I'm down 23.25" from full, there is less water per inch, perhaps that's why the rate appears to be accelerating.

Mine is down 29 inches from full pool, and leakage has virtually stopped. I am losing about 1/4 inch per 24 hours with these clear bluebird days and cool nights we are having. The dew point at night gets way below the surface temp, so pond evaporates at night too. Fog on the water proves it. My pond banks have solidified and shrank with the water down, so I am hoping my leakage will be less when the water comes back up. At least it doesn't appear to have significant leaks in the basin. If it still has any leaks, they are mostly in the upper two feet of water at full pool.

SetterGuy, if you have been having weather similar to mine, you are seeing a lot of evaporation. When the water temp is still high in the early fall, and dew points get low during a high pressure system, evaporation will increase.

John,
Hopefully that's it. I was at a loss, as to why it would start losing water at a higher rate.

Hey guys, I think its a bit of both. We haven't gotten any rain in a few weeks. Had a chance then it left also. I have seen mine ramp up just a bit, but like setter said, I have less water per inch surface area so it would stand to reason the vertical drop might be faster. Now I didn't think about what John stated. Thats a good point, we have had fog most every morning the last couple of weeks, so I bet my evap is going at night also like you said. I'm just over .5" a day. Was hovering right on .5" a day when we were in the high 90's. Maybe my seepage is around 1/4" but since we are seeing the evap at night, maybe it has increased a bit over 1/4" now? Good thoughts John!

When you see fog over the water, and not over land, that is a sign the pond is losing water to the air due to evaporation. If fog is everywhere, there is little to no evaporation since the air over both pond and land is saturated.

TJ has been encourageing me to share my story so here goes.
We capped my pond the day before Thanksgiving 2015. It is not very large - about 1/2 acre and 15 feet at its deepest point. By Christmas it was full pond and beautiful. We stocked with some trout and had a great time catching them early Spring. On April 9th I bought BG, RES, LMB, and FHM to stock. When stocking I noticed the pond was a couple of inches low. That was the beginning of a long spring and summer of watching the pond lose about 6 feet of water. I estimate I was losing between .5 to an inch a day. We finally determined that the leak was in the basin of the pond probably because it had not been packed well.
In July I tried spreading Bentonite over the pond. The depth was still about 9 feet but the loss of water continued. I had no idea where the water was going - no wet spots, way too much loss for only evaporation. I was sick about my new project.
I begain to read about SoilFloc on this sight and wondered if it would work for me.
I contacted TJ and we talked a few times about my situation. He was a great help and walked me though some testing procedures to determine what might be happening and exactly how much I was losing per day.
In August, I finally ordered 3 units of SoilFloc and made my application plans.
The first evening we tried to apply, it got dark on us and we had to quit. The second evening we atempted an application, the wind got up and we had to stop.
Finally, early in Saturday morning everything was perfect. We applied the product just as TJ has suggested and as I had read about in this thread.
After about a week, I noticed that my water loss had slowed considerably. Since we were in the midst of a severe drought I wasn't seeing the water level increase but my water loss all but stopped. My pond is spring fed so I guess what we coming in offset the evaporation amount on those hot dry days.
This past week it began to rain. We have had over 8 inches in the last 5 days. As of today, I am at full pond and watching closely as to any change or loss.
I am guardedly optimistic at this point and excited that, if we havent stopped the leak, at least it seems we have slowed it down considerably.
I'll keep you posted over the next few weeks as we watch the pond closely.
Thanks for all of your help and especially thanks to TJ for all of his help.

Welcome to the forum and your first post, John! All feedback is valuable as we're still learning as a group about polymer treatments. Glad to hear things are holding up. Thanks for sharing your experience, and keep us apprised of any changes.

No rain for last 18 days. Pond has dropped another 4.5". That's .25" per day. I'm still thinking this is pretty close to the evaporation rate. Sure would be nice to get some rain.. But Ralls county in Missouri is somehow always in a draught. I'm amazed I ever got this pond full. Ha

Question
Has anyone tried using a hand held concrete vibrater ?
I was thinking it may work to realign the clay platelets and force a seal
I was thinking of throughing on a pair of waders or from a row boat (depending on the water level) inserting the vibrating head into the bottom and working in in a grid fashion

My newest low cost option
It may even work well with soil floc

Any thoughts ?

Wow, what a thread of info!

I have yet to start really measuring water loss in my pond. I know in the spring is was fullish but no idea how deep but it does seem to lose water much more quickly than from evap. It looks like SoilFloc may be a good option but I have some questions I didn't see addressed, though I can make some assumptions...

SoilFloc apparently doesn't harm fish, as least as long as it's not thrown right on them, how does it treat people? My pond, while likely to have wildlife in it, will be primarily a swimming hole. Will this cause any problems when my kids accidentally drink the water?

I see everyone talking about how slippery it is. My plan is to likely have like pea-gravel beach where we walk into the pond (and a diving rock). Is there a method to apply the SoilFloc in this situation where it doesn't turn into a slip-n-slide? Could I apply at full pool, then add the gravel beach a bit later? Could that go for the whole pond? I'm looking for crystal clear water at full depth, if possible, and I'm reading that plant life and a decent circulation, along with gravel for microbes and junk to stick to, is the best way to achieve that. Could I SoilFloc the whole deal and put gravel in over the top of that that could be walked on or altered after the SoilFloc takes hold?

Does SoilFloc seem like a good option if you have very little previous knowledge of ponds in general and it seems as though my pond was just dug as a hole to fill up with water? I don't know that there was any legit prep of the hole...

Thanks everyone for the stories above, learning lots!

Edited to ask more questions!

Soilfloc is as slick as ice when wet on the bank. It sticks to everything, and is slimy and hard to wash off. It should be applied before any gravel, and allowed to settle before putting the gravel on top. I got it to settle better by throwing a handful of fine granular bentonite on top of it after each throw of part A, then part B of Soilfloc. I would advise waiting at least two days before swimming after it is applied. The best analogy I can make is it's like getting water resistant white glue on you if you get in the water too soon, or get it on you while applying. Wear long rubber gloves. It will gum up the gills of fish if applied heavily and directly on them.

Thanks John! The adding gravel after is actually what I was hoping to hear. If I end up using SoilFloc it sounds like I'll go pick up a few disposable coveralls.

TJ PM sent

teehjaeh57...I have a 2-acre pond out in Brenham, TX.

I have very sandy soil. When I dug the pond ~7 years ago, I clay lined the pond. Currently, I believe that I have a leak somewhere in my dam.

I am wondering if my situation would be a good application for the SoilFloc Polymer Sealant? What do you Think?

Thanks, Stacey.

Hi Stacey:

PM sent!

I'm very interested in learning more about this product.

PM Sent!

I had a leak in my dam and had success spot treating SoilFloc. I'd have to go back and search my post, but I'm guessing I'm going on year 5 or so now and its still holding.

NEDOC, how many sacks of treatment did you use and how large an area did you cover during your treatment. Did you use the two sk treatment or did you also add bentonite along with the soil floc? I remember some post where adding bentonite along with the SF helped to seal.

Bentonite is only used if polymer is floating during application, it serves as sinking agent - but does nothing to help promote a seal otherwise. We have only used bentonite in response to floating polymer in 5% of projects, if that many. But it's something I mention "just in case" so the pond owner is aware and prepared to address float issues during application.

I'm just guessing on my area, as I'd have to go back to the thread where I put my info. I may do that later if I can find it. I believe it was about 12' x 100' area that I applied. I applied two units in that area. I was planning on treating the entire body of water but that seemed to do the job.

I conversed with TJ on my leak issues. My 1/2 acre pond in central Alabama was dug last year for the second time. 1st time we hit rock or sandstone on one end and it would never hold water or fill for that matter. So I repositioned the pond and dug it more on the clay side. Some areas were sandy below the clay and eventually hit rock. We spread the clay capping the bottom and sides with a dozer. The pond is between 2 hills with a 20ft damn on the low side. The dam was build with the best clay I had and we dug it down about 5ft below the bottom of the pond before we built it up layer by layer of packed clay. The 2 hills was where all the clay was but the bottom of the valley is where most of the rock was located. We packed about 2ft of clay on the bottom but the way the bottom of the pond is formed, it all slopes to the dam. I waited of rain water to fill the pond which was a slow processes over 6 months. Rain was far between at 1st and the pond would eventually dry before the next rain. This caused all the watershed water to run down the valley against my dam. This fast running of water dug trenches in the bottom of my pond and because it wouldn't fill It kept washing out these trenches time and time again until my clay liner was gone. Eventually we started getting more rain with lots of rain fall. The pond filled to my over flow siphon system. But because of the washouts in my clay liner, I was losing water fast.
This is when I gave TJ a call. I told him what was going on. He asked many questions to make sure that there was no other problems that also needed to be addressed. He suggested I get a baseline of my water leakage and put a pipe with 1/2in increments on it to measure daily water lost. After a week I reported back to him that I was loosing 2in per day.
We were confident that it wasn't leaking through the dam and my biggest issue was down the center of the pond floor were the natural valley had washed out my clay liner. We estimated that area to be a 1/4 acre in size and he suggested I put out 6 units of soilfloc on it.
I waited until a good rain came and gave me almost full pool and also waited for an evening with no wind. I got 2 neighbors over to hold a rope across my pond. I had 3ft markers on each bank for them to move to after each pass as my son pulled the boat along the rope as I through out a scoop of each part of the soilfloc. After a few passes we decided it was easier to mix the 2 parts in a 5 gallon bucket. It seemed to have a better mixing affect as it hit the water and was a lot easier on me and the guys on the bank. You just have to make sure everything is staying dry because any moisture will cause it to gel once it's mixed. We continued to cover the area marker by marker but I found throwing the mix high and far made a more even coat once it hit the water. If I tried to throw it in my 3ft area, some would hit the water in a clump and it wouldn't mix well on the water. These white clumps crystalized and lasted for days on the water before it sunk. Throwing it high and far hit the water like a fine dust and made a good gel. So we decided to forget the 3ft grid pattern. I'd sling a scoop out as far as I could and work our way from bank to bank. You could see the thick gel floating on the water so you had a visual marker to throw to each pass. I covered the 1/4 acre area thinking it was very thick and it was. I couldn't have put any more on it because when I would throw more on top of the gel, it wouldn't get wet and stay white powder on top. It seemed like there was 6in of more of gel on the water and I covered my target area and only went through 3 of the 6 units. I didn't want to drag the boat through the gelled area to add more soilfloc because I was afraid of cutting gaps in the gel and not getting a good solid blanket on the bottom. So we called it a night.
The next morning It had all sank except the few white clumps where I put it too thick, but in a few days they sank. I was debating what I should do with the other 3 units. Should I cover the same area again super thick, or put a thinner layer over the whole 1/2 acre. It was windy for a few days so I had time to think about it and watch my water level. It seemed to work almost over night. With in a few days my pond went from loosing 2in a day to 1/2 an inch a day with only 1/2 the suggested application.
Now I was really confused. Did I seal the target area and have a small leak else where, or is my leak still in the target area. I decided I was gonna coat the whole pond with the remaining 3 units. I did it alone, paddling the boat starting at one end of the pond and working my way back, throwing it high and far. I mixed all my remaining units in 5 gallon buckets on the bank and took 5 at a time with me. It covered the pond well. It was thicker than I thought. Being that the whole pond was full of it, it seemed to level itself out uniformly as it pushed off the banks. In a few hours it sank.
Now my pond is losing water at a 1/4in or less daily. This stuff is pretty amazing. Thanks to TJ for all his help.

Question: Can SoilFloc lock down bottom muck? My plastic lined pond (1/10th acre), treated with bacteria and RapidClear floc, has collected very fine dusty looking (like limestone powder) leftover muck. Large catfish stir it up, but, with the floc it sinks fairly quickly. I'd like to have it solidified on the bottom, if possible.

Jason that's a great summary of the application process - I've learned something new regarding your methods - I'm going to try that on my next project, thanks for sharing. 2" daily from 1/2 ac pond meant you were losing 27,000 gallons daily - now it's down to 1/4" at 3,375 gallons - and some of that is due to evaporation. From 2" daily vertical water loss to 1/4" is an amazing turnaround - happy for your results and am here to help anytime. Enjoyed working together - thanks for posting your results.

TJ

Ping me anytime at tj@hudlandmgmt.com - happy to help with some ideas, but don't think the polymer is a solution, rather target those catfish and consider removing.

Swampsnyper, thanks for taking the time to share and i agree with you, compared to your other options, soilfloc was a great invention!

I too found that applying one scoop of part A and B was too tedious. I actually used a hand grass seed spreader but loaded the spreader with 1 scoop A, then 1 scoop B, etc till full. I let the twirly at the bottom mix the two as it came out the bottom. It also gave a very nice even white coating on top of the water which then would slowly sink into a gel-y mess. By having a nice even coating on the water I didn't have to worry so much about pacing out the intervals on shore, I could see where I had been and just painted lanes of white powder as I went.

For me it helped to have a shore crew move me at a nice slow steady speed while I worked on cranking the seed spreader. I'm sure your idea of putting equal mixtures in a bucket, stirring thoroughly and then trying to throw it in a smooth high arc to get it to settle evenly would work well too.

Like you I agreed to buy more than I ended up needing. I did a fall application and then kept the rest dry and did it again the next spring. I ended up a year later doing a 3rd light application because I like how it works, and each application seemed to work a little bit more. I also wanted to focus a little more on the banks where occasionally we get high water and then wicking into the surrounding soil and grass.

Especially I notice the bottom in the shallows now instead of being loose sand is like a hard packed sand that you almost have to chisel through. If you try to take a stick and poke it into the sandy bottom it just won't go in. That tells me we have some pretty good congealing or sealing of the sediment particles.

Thanks for sharing!

That's quite a testimonial, SS. It's good to hear that folks are having positive results.

I got lucky the other day and found one leak that I was able to fix, at least temporarily, but it's looking like I'm going to need to floc, at least, the area where the dam was re-cored to stop a couple little seeps that don't have an obvious source.

I have a .10 acre pond that was leaking 2 1/8 inches a day. There was also visible water on the backside of the dam. I pump water from a seasonal creek so i filled the pond a few times to confirm the vertical water loss. I contacted TJ and he spent a lot of time going over my options and we decided to try one unit mostly along the dam, its a long c shaped dam on the side of a hill mostly caliche soil. The second day after soilfloc application the visible water flowing behind the dam stopped. In about 5 days the vertical water loss was down to 5/8 inches per day, which if you know what my part of the country looks like, is very good. This pond started out as just a source for road base for our driveway. Thanks to TJ for his time and help and the old-fashioned way of doing business.

I love helping the Pond Boss family save tons of $$$ and helping slow down stubborn leaks! Thanks for updating us on your project and I�m glad we are hanging onto that water. Now it�s time to enjoy your pond and make many memories!

Please contact me, I to have a leak problem.

We get a ton of frogs in our leaky pond. Once I've convinced myself to start spending some money I'm thinking either SoilFloc or drying the whole thing out and putting good clay down or maybe rubber. Does anyone have experience with non-fish wildlife on their SoilFloc'd ponds? Would frogs survive? It seems like they dig holes on the sides of the pond but I'm not sure. I'd like to keep the frogs around with basically the same population they have now (thousands! Little, tiny ones too!) but I'm afraid the SoilFloc may prohibit that? Also, how close can plants grow, or will plants grow at all into the SoilFloc? It seems like that would be counterproductive?

Installing a 12-24" liner of high plasticity clay in 6" lifts is the best way to seal a pond, but it's also often cost prohibitive. Polymer is environmentally safe and in my experience does not impact wildlife [amphibians] or fish negatively. I've seen a few FHM dead following a polymer treatment in a windblown corner of a pond that had the polymer coat the gills and suffocate, but that's been my only personal experience of a kill event. I've never seen any impact to aquatic vegetation - I like to treat ponds when vegetation is dormant. Feel free to reach out anytime, happy to discuss clay liner install or polymer and help in any manner possible.

tj@hudlandmgmt.com

TJ

TJ, what would you think about using this on wet soil after drawdown?
I'm thinking of pulling down about 3ft vertical which will give me 6-9' of shoreline. I don't seem to have any serious leak but just ever so slightly more loss than evaporation alone. Livable but thought maybe it wouldn't hurt??
I only have 2 lifts with soda ash from 6ft up to shore. 3 lifts 6-8' and 4 from 8-12'.

I've performed dry application on my own pond this Summer and sealed a 3" daily leak completely by applying directly on the gravel seams we uncovered. We plated 12" of high plasticity clay in 4" lifts and compacted, but I think the polymer was the trick.

Provided you could raise the water level immediately after application I think it's worth trying. The benefit of dry application is the precision gained on measuring polymer amounts per 11 sq ft. I'd recommend using a drop spreader to ensure you're applying the correct volume. If I had a sidewall band to treat I'd go with dry application due to ease of application and precision of measurement. Winging it from a boat is messy and time consuming and requires 3 unlike dry application one can perform solo.

Thanks TJ! I'm very slow to react and make real (read expensive) decisions but I may reach out to you sometime!

TJ,
I am interested in hearing more about your dry ground application. I am seriously considering same for my .9 acre pond. It is almost dry and I intend to spend some time removing vegetation and compacting with my skid steer loader. Then I would like to try a dry application. The following video has me convinced it will work. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Eq8hgAM-wU

While I�ve used polymers with great success sealing ponds I harbor issues with that video - namely, they are FAR exceeding the recommended application amount to affect a seal. So while it looks compelling it's just not an accurate representation of the polymer ability. I can explain further - give me a call 402.730.4897 or drop on email anytime at tj@hudlandmgmt.com.

My primary job for the past 44 yrs has been to stabilize well bores. This included controlling fluid/water losses when drilling sands, fractured formations, and reducing water losses into water absorbing shales and clays. We used polymers and clays(bentonite etc) and corn starch when sealing off these formations. It's my opinion that a combination of both clay along starch works best to reduce fluid/water losses. But I have some concerns when using starch in fresh water ponds. So polymers with clays are most likely be the best way to go. There are several ways it might be applied depending on what the problem might be. I am not trying to step on Tj's recommendation's or to market another product. Fact is I have bought SoilFloc off of Tj to seal off vertical walls in my sediment pond. But here only to pass along a little experience on how to seal off water seepage. Here is a little information. Phillips Petroleum designed a product (polymer) back in the 60's that was used to spread on the ground so when it rained the water would run off and not absorbed into the ground. Or what we call water loss control. This was designed to stop the mud slides in California. This product was adapted to the drilling of wells to reduce water losses which most likely lead to water loss control in ponds.

Thanks Tracy! Very interesting stuff. I really like learning about the evolution of technologies and how they are repurposed for even more benefit.

We moved to our large acreage 30 years ago and the only thing it lacked was a reliable pond. There is a pond dam for about a 1/10 acre pond that drains roughly 15-20 acres of grassland, but nearly every summer it is dry except for a few weeks. One problem is that there is a brown sandstone type rock in the immediate area and also some glacial till. Also I didn't keep up with the trees around the pond site and now there are a couple of dozen 30 year old cottonwoods plus a few of other species. Cutting them down will be one of my major projects this winter. Or if I get inpatient, hire a contractor to come in to get rid of them.

This past summer was one of the wettest on record for our area. Instead of being dry except for a few weeks, the pond had water in it except for a few weeks. A nearby creek was also running good all summer, and the better it runs it seems like the more likely the pond will have some water in it. Full depth to the overflow is maybe 8 feet but the pond loses water pretty fast down to the ring of cottonwoods at about 4 foot of depth. The banks are not eroded, there is a sediment pond uphill, and the bottom does not have a lot of sediment load in it.

I'm not expecting to ever have a fishing pond, but am willing to experiment with SoilFloc to see if it can keep several feet of water in it most years. Depending on how much chainsaw work I do there this winter, the plan is to throw in some SoilFloc from shore this Spring when it's at the 4 foot depth, then followup with another application from shore when it's closer to the overflow depth.

Wish me luck!

Hey Husker!

Feel free to reach out anytime as I�ve worked on hundreds of polymer projects and am happy to help in any way I can. I can also get my Pond Boss family a discount on the polymer.

Tj@hudlandmgmt.com

In respect of polymer flocs for ponds, it would be great to have a product that also held the sunken muck. leaves, etc in place or otherwise prevented re-entrainment in the water column. Ideally, it would still allow bacteria and enzymes access to the organic material.

I know every project is unique, but in your opinion, what are the chances that this product could replace the necessity of using a liner for a small pond? I live in a valley and get tons of water runoff in my backyard, to the point where it�s always wet almost anytime of the year. I�ve dug a small hole (maybe 3� x 3� and 18� deep) and it�s held water for the most part for three weeks now. My plan for it is simply as a small bait pond, maybe something in the area of 10� x 10�, and 3 to 4 feet deep. I want to keep it as natural as possible, and don�t want to invest in a liner, but I will if I have to. Any thoughts on this? Would bentonite clay or a liner be a better option? Thank you.

For your needs, the cheapest liner would be to buy a used billboard sign tarp. Probably one tarp would be all you need and you could cut the short way and adhere two pieces side by side to cover the bottom and sides and even have extra.

It is simple to attach to pieces using standard PVC pipe primer and glue.

The tarps are freely available on ebay and very cheap. You have to be a little cautious when wheeling loads of dirt or gravel on it to not puncture it but they are pretty tough. A tiny split can easily be patched with additional sign tarp and glue.

There is a thread about this where a much larger pond was lined this way and it worked really well (and is still holding).

Hi Steve:

Bentonite can seal a pond - it must be tilled into the liner and plated and compacted with 12-18" high plasticity clay in 6" lifts. Adding bentonite between each layer of clay can provide additional insurance. Cost of bentonite install is typically high considering one must have a dry area in which to work and a contractor on site to operate equipment [dozer, sheepsfoot roller, maybe an excavator]. Bentonite also must be sourced and freight can be expensive. Lastly, not all bentonite is created equally, expansion rates vary from 2x to 16x. The chances your provider will truly know are slim, so one is guessing on application rates, which can further drive up your cost.

Pond liners run $1 - $2/sq ft professionally installed - for most projects this blows the budget out of the water - but considering your small footprint it might be an option.

I have zero experience with billboard liners - have to defer to others.

A clay liner installed is the best long term solution, but again you're looking at equipment costs, contractor involvement, and one needs access to high plasticity clay to install 12-24" compacted in 6" lifts.

I like polymers as they are far cheaper, require no equipment or contractors involved, and can be applied to a hydrated pond. Often I find the polymer the most cost effective route to take. We're reducing seepage by at least 50% in nearly all the projects in which I've been involved. Feel free to ping me anytime, happy to walk through your options - sounds like a cool project!

tj@hudlandmgmt.com

Awesome, Swamp!

Awesome, thank you TJ and Canyon for the replies and information.

I am looking for something to help with a dug pond. I am in South Texas and the pond was dug and lined with clay from our site whe nwe built a house right before Hurricane Harvey. The pond was coming up slowly and Harvey filled it completely in about 8 hours. This washed the clay fairly deeply. We have decent drainage to the pond and also have a 1 inch line for pumping when needed. Seems like you can get it to about 6 feet then it starts leaking. Maximum depth is probably around 10 feet.

Any help would be appreciated.

Edit: It is about 1/2 acre in size.

Hi Bam and welcome to the forum. Are you experiencing water loss due to a leak in your clay liner? If so feel free to reach out anytime -I help guys nationwide to address pond seeping issues and my time is free to my Pond Boss Family.

Feel free to ping me anytime: tj@hudlandmgmt.com

Update and a question on my 1/10 acre pond renovation.

First the question. I am cutting down several 24" diameter cottonwoods that will be in about 4' of water if I can get the pond sealed with SoilFloc. Am hoping to get an excavator to dig out the stumps and fill in the holes with dirt from the bottom/sides of the pond. I'm concerned about the stump holes needing time for the dirt to settle, and also about the cottonwood roots sprouting all over the place even though I'm putting Tordon RTU on each stump as soon as it is cut. How long should I wait before applying SoilFloc?

Second, the update. Unseasonably nice weather here in southeast Nebraska. Highs in the 40s and even lower 50s through Thursday this week, so my chainsaw has been seeing daily duty. Got about 1/3 of the trees cut down including all of them that were on the face of the dam. Big brush piles to burn this Spring or Summer. Hope the excavator can handle the cottonwood logs, anything over about 16" is too much for my chainsaw and tractor. There is a place nearby where they can get put, wish someone around here had a use for them. HOWEVER, as I type this on Friday there are several inches of snow on the ground and more on the way, with a high of 22 tomorrow. So may not get back down there for a month or two as it's about 400 yards from the house on a north facing slope.

I purchased 4 units of SoilFloc that should arrive Tuesday (Pending the crazy taking place). I plan on treating the dam side of the pond fairly heavily. Right now the chara is at a minimum, but there are leaves here and there.

I was expecting a few hands with this process, but due to this corona virus issue, it looks like I only have a wife and a 13yo PIA to help. What ideas do you have to help apply this stuff? I have to be creative now, but could still likely get a few supplies to help this go well.

So far I have bright nylon twine and large nails to mark off the areas to cover in a sort of grid. I plan on inflating my float boat, but worried about spills making it impossible to work.

What about tossing in slat instead of bentonite to weigh things down to help it sink? I figured even the dissolved salt will cause the expanding material to be heavier than the surrounding water, bringing it down. Since I have some salt left over from winter, it is fair game.

liquidsquid, I plan to treat part of my pond some day with SoilFloc. I'll run my small aluminum boat around under outboard power stirring up the bottom mud. This will give the polymer lots of suspended particles to flocculate.

Do you have access to a small outboard and appropriate boat that you could use? Or, could you rake the bottom enough to raise a bit of mud?

I look forward to your results, and any tips you get. How much are you loosing per day?

This time of year I have overflow due to plenty of inflow from a small creek, but in the summer I can lose about an inch a day. By late fall it looks like a half-flushed toilet bowl. Sometimes I can lose water as it is still coming in.

It's clear I have general seepage as the entire backside of the dam is covered in cattails, starting only about 2 feet down in elevation from max water level. My soil has clay, and a lot of rocks. The excavator only compacted with a bulldozer. It wasn't enough.

So I will try to rake out some chara and stir some shiz up. The water is currently exceptionally clear, visibility to 8-9 feet. All the fish are sheltering under the dock to get out of the sun, so probably not enough suspended particles to do the trick.

I do have a canoe and an electric motor, but that is pretty weak by comparison to even a 8HP motor. Plus the canoe is shedding fiberglass, so I don't feel like itching through the process. Maybe I will throw a bunch of sand in the bottom of the float boat for traction.

Liquidsquid, did you get your Soilfloc? If so did you apply it?

The Soilfloc arrived in 8 rather large and heavy boxes. Of course piled in front of the garage door.

I have not applied it yet, it has been quite weird dealing with Covid-19 around here (lots of people have it now), and the weather has not been suitable. It is tough in March to get a still day for this. Today I removed by hand a large section of cattails. Feeling a little pooped now. Don't want to overdo it and then get that stupid bug and drop dead.

I ran some polymer string to mark the area I intend to work, and getting ready to go as soon as we have a still day. Then the dumb perch decided that is a great area to drop ribbons yesterday. Dummies. I need to blow up that float boat and train the kid to paddle my butt around properly. I am thinking a rope pull may be easier to deal with rather than a string.

I intend to document the process as much as I can. in fact may run down with the cam and take a few video shorts.

I think my leaker is doing a bit better over time. It is 15 inches higher than this date last year. The Koi I put in two years ago have kept it muddy, and the stirred up clay may have sealed it somewhat. Soilfloc might work better in a muddy pond. Unfortunately, otters have been in again, and probably damaged the fish population.

Liquidsquid, you probably have come across this long thread before, but if it helps, go back to the first page and see some pictures and description of how I did it. I found a boat of anytype with a rope across and a person on each end pulling you back and forth is by far the easiest. You soon find that the width of each 'swath' is not that critical. You can seasily see the floating white goo on top and you can decide how thick you want it by how much overlap you do of each 'swath'. I found a hand held fertilizer spreader allowed me to crank a nice even pattern on top of the water. It wasn't that hard if you are just sitting in the boat, mixing part A and B, and cranking the spreader while 2 people on shore keep you in place in your swath and also help keep the speed correct as you go back and forth across.

Older soilfloc instruction thread

Liquidsquid, my pond build was similar to yours. I have rocky clay, and my builder only used a high lift to compact. I think he did ok on the dam. I see no signs of water getting past it. The bowl is another story, I think it got very little compaction. While I still have hope that mine will keep getting better, and it still shows signs of getting better, the higher the water level gets, the slower it seems to be about getting better. I think some Soilfloc would help my pond, and might give it a try someday. If it was cheaper, and easier to apply, I probably would have already tried it. Just trying to plan help and no wind is tough enough. Lol!

Mine is running out the overflow pipe again. Last year was just at average rainfall for us. I think my leak has slowed with the soilfloc and passing of time. Possibly natural sediments.
I will say seeing a full pond is nice.

I am chomping at the bit to get it done, but it has been interesting to say the least here in NY with this whole Covid-19 business. My neighbors behind us that were going to help, got it . They are OOC for a while. Local hardware store went out of business. Other hardware store closes before I can get to it... now I have 60# 400' of paracord instead of rope. The other rope I could have used would have been more than $250 in 4x100' sections. If I can get some real rope I will, but the paracord is all I've got for now.

I also couldn't get goggles from the local store. All sold out. Apparently to keep toilet paper dust out of your eyes or something.

Update:

I've got an excavator coming this afternoon or tomorrow to finish up taking out all the trees and stumps! It's been a dry month with a foot or less of water in the bottom of the pond. Then I'll need to get a unit of SoilFloc to put in as soon as we get some rain. Will be emailing you tj!

The good news: 97% good soil and clay throughout the sides and bottom of the pond area. The bad news: the excavator found a sandy area on the side of the basin near one end of the dam. Can't say I was surprised - there are other areas of sandy soils that can be found in the section where I live. The sandy area was at approximately the same elevation as where the water level would drop down to within a few days of a rain. Then a slower drop over several weeks until dry, maybe because of silt partially sealing the bottom there for the last few feet.

At least now I know where to concentrate my efforts. The excavator put some good dirt over the sandy area, as best he could. Still very dry here, some occasional showers, total of 0.20 inches for the past couple of weeks, but maybe a chance of some decent rain starting on the weekend.

When I think of all the work I've done the last 6 months cutting down trees, the $1,400 for the excavator was a bargain. Wish I'd thought of it last Fall.

What's next with our "97% OK" pond.
After conferring with TJ, we'll be waiting and seeing what happens once we get some rain, and are painting up some metal fence posts to put in the basin to use for depth gauges. He also had some good advice on what to put in it to help control mosquitoes.
Only a living room sized puddle in the bottom for now. The new total depth is about 10 to 12 feet with the sandy area about half way up on one side wall. It's got at least one granite boulder courtesy of the glaciers, I dug at it a little but gave up with a basketball sized piece exposed. Am using my tractor to try to put a foot or so of good dirt/clay over the small sandy area that is still exposed.
Long term, will monitor how well it is holding water (if/when we get enough rain to put something in it) then decide if will try SoilFloc by itself or may need to put clay over the sandy area to slow down any leaks, then followup with SoilFloc if a little extra something is still needed.

Happy to help - hoping when the rains finally arrive here in NE she holds like a tub and you won't need any treatments!

Well, I finally applied the Soilfloc to the dam. I spent almost two weeks of sporadic time tossing in a rake and pulling out Chara. It just kept coming out! Then I rolled probably a ton of stone back up and out that I dumped in when I clean up stones to mow (10lb rocks and up). I am getting in shape...

So what I wound up doing is waiting for a very light breeze from the north to help keep stuff contained on the south side of the pond. I cast a fair amount from shore to about 6' out, and went over twice with two coats but not quite enough to just sit on top white clumps. Then I strung two lines across the pond of the paracord about 4' apart parallel to the dam, and 30' out. I then ran the cord through the gunwales of my little blow-up boat to keep it aligned.

I put part A in one large feed bucket, and part B in another at either end of the boat. I used smaller canning jars to cast it. Those jars didn't work all that well. I should have some larger cups or something without a restrained mouth.

So I was easily able to run the boat back and forth across the pond, and kept casting it towards the dam. The light breeze kept pushing it towards the material I cast from shore and would sort of run into it and stay. I was able to go back and forth 4 times when it finally backed up to the boat. I cast more to the point it was starting to sit on the surface in glops.

Mistake 1. Should have done it while on a colder day. I couldn't take the heat in the painting suit, so I stripped to shorts and a shirt. The dust stuck to my sweat and my cloths.
Mistake 2. Bare hands. Wow, this stuff is near impossible to finally get off!
Mistake 3. Expecting clean-off in the lawn with cold water to not take long. The slime just keeps coming! Soap, water, scrub, lava soap, water, my God it wont stop! Tossed out my cloths. Don't want that stuff in the septic tank for obvious reasons.
Mistake 4. Trying to unwind the paracord by chucking it. One big knot which took about 15 minutes to sort out.
Mistake 5. Expecting to ever use the blowup boat again. It is covered with dust and damp material. If it is anything like trying to clean myself off, it is done.

This morning there was a breeze from the opposite direction, but absolutely no indication of any Soilfloc on the surface or on the bottom. I worry I didn't apply enough, but I wound up only using 1.75 units. I have 2.25 left over! I may treat the west end in a similar fashion as I think I have a slow leak in the very bottom there also.

I am really hoping the backside of the dam finally dries up so I can actually mow it. Let alone slowing any leaks. Fingers crossed this has an impact in a few days time!

You're applying polymer in a loin cloth? No wonder things got messy.

Not quite, but I was in my tighty whities in the front yard (we are away from the road) giving out blood donations to the local mosquitoes while trying to clean off the polymer snot for a good half hour.

Speaking of which, that material is something else in that running your hand through the water and seeing how much is actually applied... the streamers of "snot" is wild. From the best I could tell, a basic application would swell to at least a foot thick on the surface before it sank, but it is so transparent it is hard to make out.

Also the tadpoles kept right on swimming through it, though this morning I didn't see any tadpoles. I think they may not have liked the material all that much from a long exposure. It's possible they are currently helping to clog the soil :-(. The fish didn't seem to care at all.

The strangest part to me is how I can not see any evidence of having applied the material at all. I expected to see the stuff resting on the bottom, or globs here and there, but nothing evident. Is this normal?

It rained last night and now I get to start measuring water depth anxiously over the next few days to see how much impact this has. I have my fingers crossed that the single application is enough to help. Before I applied two days ago I was losing 0.75" a day despite a small amount of water coming into the pond from a creek and ground water seepage.

I have applied this several times and can concur that the stuff has to basically wear off your boat or hands and clothes rather than wash off.

best to apply in warmer water (another application in July or August when water is warm is fine) and when water is at full pool to help push it down into the cracks at the bottom.

Outside of that, I did the same you did, ordered way too much up front and then got to do 2 or 3 staged applications which I think was a good plan anyway.

I used a handcranked seed spreader but a solo cup or wide flat plastic bowl would be super too.

It is one of the reasons I waited, the water was closer to 75F, which is almost as warm as it gets for us. It is just frigging hard to do it by yourself. I couldn't seem to align no wind and people availability and gave up. I hurried down right after dinner and squeezed it in before dark.

So did you apply multiple times because it wasn't very effective the first time? Or do you think you just missed where the leak was? I was afraid to dump too much in at once as it would just glop on top. I wasn't too worried about being too thin since it seemed I had too much material and could apply again. I just don't want to. It wasn't very fun.

Well, i didn't know where my leak was in my .25 acre puddle. I had a helper and we marked out the lanes on the grass but it turns out it isn't that fussy. we just had a rope on each end of the lane and you could easily see where the white film was on the water...so we just moved over another 3 feet or so into open water and broadcast to cover about 3' swaths at a time. The stuff floats around and merges even in the lightest wind so we did a good heavy coating till it was gelling on top. Then went around the edges and broadcast heavy on the edges. The hope was that putting some up on the banks would allow the water to come up higher and stay higher too.

I think my first application worked great. i easily could see less daily water loss. i just had 2 units left and wanted to use them and not store them. So i did my first application in late summer or early fall, the next one the next summer and used the last of it later that next fall. I don't know that the other applications helped that much more but it is likely that ground water seams could open up so a retreatment made sense to me.

I still have the luxury of almost no vegetation although I worry my heavy layer of non-decaying oak leaves in the deep may block the action of the polymer. I might just buy a unit of each and retreat some time again as i can really tell that the sand in the shallows gets rock hard like the sand grout between your patio stones in the shallows and to me that is good for something..

Squid

I've worked on hundreds of these projects the past five years and am a volunteer for Pond Boss - why didn't you contact me for instruction/direction/advice? My time is free, I've done everything wrong hundreds of times, and by process of elimination the remaining methods have proven to be reliable. Should have contacted me and learned from my mistakes. That goes for everyone - happy to help you avoid my costly errors! Don't be shy!

TJ

TJ, Where would the fun in that be? I started down the correct path, read this thread a few times, but my limited time window and no help from the peanut gallery got me into the mess and I rushed the job. Meant to talk it out with you for sure! But I had no idea when I could pull the trigger. I have been waiting near 3 months for this. A sales person got me in a moment of weakness on the original purchase.

You know how it goes when there is too much going on... one guy cutting down some trees (dead ash) near the road while I have a small team in the backyard putting in a paver patio while the wife is working, and the kiddo with a 53 average in math because too many video games. (That problem is resolved, thank God). I just needed to get the fsk out and do something I wanted to do.

For one, it was too damned hot to wear a suit. I'm not from the south, so I cant take 90+ heat and high humidity. Just no. Suffered in other ways at the end, but it sure beat passing out from heat stroke.

Then somebody used up all the solo cups!!! Wasn't for beer, which is excusable. Teenagers! Grabbed the next best option that was disposable, glass jars. I should have purchased a few hand spreaders or any number of options, but a quick scan of the house revealed coffee mugs or bell jars.

My inflatable boat is on its last legs, it should have died years ago. It would be no real loss. You should have seen it after last night's rain! The inside looked pretty interesting with goo, but I was able to scoop out the wads of jell and chuck it.

I rescued the shorts, once they dried it came off. The golf shirt was a complete loss.

So I have been thinking about a slip and slide down the hill on the grass... anyone tried it on purpose yet? I hear the not on purpose is no fun.

The next application round should go a lot better.

BTW, already noticing an improvement on the wettest spot of the back of the dam. What used to be a running trickle is now just wet. Not bad for a day-ish. I'm sure there is still quite a lot of water to drain from the soil and remaining time for the sealant to fully swell.

Two days out:
Big farm pond lost 1/4 inch in two days (whut?!?) and rubber-lined pond lost 1/2 inch. So um, early to say, but certainly better than the 1+ inch I would have gotten with no treatment in the big pond, and even better than the 1/2 inch I expected.

The small garden pond water was warmer, so higher evap when the cold weather hit.

Wow! Liquidsquid, that sounds like great results! If I got results half that good, I'd be more than happy.

It is absolutely stunning the difference! I highly suspected the application would be effective because of my soil type and lack of compaction, but I dared not hope it would work so well. I lost 1/8" of an inch since yesterday this time, and it is cool and dry out. I would have easily lost another inch before this. Since the application last week I lost a little over an inch total!

I am a little disappointed there is still a trickle of water from a leak on the upper middle of the dam, though from what I can tell it is far less than what it used to be. I was shooting for dried up for mowability. For this alone I may try treating again when the pond is full. Down about 5 inches now from full so it will take a fair amount of rain to get back up there, which may not be until the fall.

My running theory is I am gaining some water from uphill that is compensating for evaporation. There are a few trickles here and there.

Does it make any sense to treat the damp bare shoreline and maybe up to a foot out? Or is that just a waste?

What made you go with soilfloc instead of damit? I am from missouri and have a 3/4 acre pond that leaks about an inch a day. The back side of the dam is a soupy mess. I really think i just got a bunch of seepage goin on. I cut a willow tree down last year that was on the back side of the damn at the bottom and i think my problem has got worse. Any advice would greatly be appreciated if anyone has had any results.

Joe, I'm sure liquidsquid has his own rationale, but for me it was because a very helpful forum member had lots of experience with soilfloc and gave freely of his time and expertise to help me through it. I figured after 100 projects or more with soilfloc he must have had a reason to continue to use it and to help others use it. His success rate is good, i suspect if he understands your exact situation and helps you, you will also be a believer. I have no experience with the other product and I don't think others on this forum have mentioned using it before either. Perhaps we are just ignorant of the pros and cons of this alternative product.

sounds good i will take a look at it. Thanks

So I called soilfloc and it’s going to be about 6500 to do the whole pond. Has any one ever tried just doing the area they thought it was leaking from because then I can get by with about 1200. Thanks in advance

Hello Joe and welcome to the forum.

I'm a volunteer for Pond Boss and help guys with whatever I can from my experience - one of those items is leaking ponds as I own 7 and they've all historically leaked to one degree or another. We've worked on over 200 projects for Pond Boss members over the past five years, and I can count on one hand the number of projects that would cost that much. I spend my time helping guys SAVE money on treatments - but then again I don't work for the company, I work for the Pond Boss members - and that's my goal.

Feel free to reach out anytime, no way a .75 ac pond should cost that much to address, additionally, I seriously doubt you need to treat the entire pond. I'm confident that by working together we can achieve a much simpler, cheaper solution. Ask around, I've helped a few guys here save significant money, and I'm happy to chat anytime.

tj@hudlandmgmt.com

Joe,
I only treated the suspect areas of my pond. Which were the dam and the eastern bank. Lots of gravel seen during construction on the eastern bank, and the sheeps foot roller shot craps during the last part of the dam build. After the soilfloc treatment my leak went from 1/2” per day to 1/4” per day. That was two or three years ago. I think it may have slowed down even more. I’ve been completely full, and at times running out the overflow pipe all spring. I staked out a grid to cover before I got started.

Just to back up a little, Soilfloc came to TJ's and my attention right around the same time, so we have both been researching it and following progress over the years. I wanted to hold off to get an idea if this is a long-term fix or something that I have to apply every few years. From what I have seen so far, it is long term enough to be of no real concern. Where I am usually busy as hell with more than one project at a time, I have unable to reach out and help very often. TJ has been exceedingly generous with his time and effort of helping keep costs under control, how to apply, what not to do, and what to expect. Reach out to him for any questions.

I generally post here and try to keep things light and useful when possible.

A little information: My pond is almost exactly 1/2 acre. I was able to treat from the shoreline out about 24ft of just the dam on the downhill suspected seepage area with more than enough material, maybe even a little too much, with only 2 units. I purchased 4 units (4x A, 4x B) for insurance and the possibility that I discover a leak somewhere else if the first application didn't meet my expectations. There is no hard rule that you have to purchase and apply all of your material at once. The last thing you want is 20 huge bags of material you cannot get wet floating around in your shed for years. Imagine this stuff popping inside your shed/barn then getting wet!

I prepped my pond by manual weed removal as much as i could as I had large mounds of chara in the bottom with a highly alkaline pond. I simply had a large landscape rake on a thin rope and got really good at tossing it out to 24ft from shore. I talked to a local pond maintenance crew about treating the pond chemically for chara, and they claimed the copper treatments kill the stuff, but it takes a long time to break down when in water to a clean bottom, especially if the bottom goes anaerobic when the thermocline shows up in summer. The curly-leafed pondweed in general doesn't really grow on the dam much, but on the flat bottom, so got rid of that too. I wanted the best shot of success so I made darned sure it was as clean as I could get it.

I removed the piles of stone I had created to be used as walk-outs for fishing and shelter for small critters. Partly because they all sunk into the mud and were useless, and partly I wanted the soilfloc under them when I replace the rocks later. I also need to put down a sheet of landscape fabric to keep them from sinking as much when it put them back in. I like the idea of sitting on the rocks and fishing. Adds a little interest to an otherwise plain bowl.

Now I am not so sure I want the rocks back, as I may want to hit things one more time on pond full to be satisfied in the application.

Do not have a leak but if I remember right , someone said it was very hard to pound a stake in the ground after they used Soilfloc. Would this work to make the bottom hard for a swimming area that right now you sink 4 to 5 inches in? The bottom is black dirt not clay. Sorry if I should of made this in it's own thread.

nehunter, from my experience I don't think that would make the difference you are looking for. I've filled my swimming area with sand and surrounded the underwater portion of it with 6" pvc or concrete bags. While not perfect that has helped.

I am in contact now with teehjaeh57 now. I will probably order some from him and apply as he recommends. I would be happy if i could just slow the leak down. I will keep you all posted with updates.
Thanks for all the help.

Hey Liquidsquid, are things still holding good?

About rocks sinking in mud: I put down some junk plywood and put the rocks on top of that. It takes a long time for exterior plywood to rot underwater.

Please explain

It is holding well still. Based on observations from previous years with lack of runoff, we would have been down near 36" by now. Instead we are down about 12", 6 of which were from before I had a chance to seal the pond. It has been an exceptionally hot summer for us, so I am pleased. 6" since the application near two months ago with no runoff events is far less than I would have experienced otherwise.

The other side of the dam, areas that would have standing or slightly flowing water are now only moist if not dry. I know I still have a small leak somewhere as I loose a little more than evaporation. Honestly I cannot believe how well a single application to just the dam has performed.

I may hit is again since I have so much leftover material, and then share some with a neighbor on the same situation.

Liquidsquid, that is great to hear! I will probably try it someday. I've got to get a boat first, which I'm working on.

JoeDK, did you ever get some Soilfloc?

Bob I did. I applied my first unit yesterday afternoon. I went thicker then recommended but I still had one unit cover about .15 acre. I’m not sure what I did wrong. I had everything mapped out and ropes up and applied 3 oz of a and b as recommended but I still stretched one unit to do almost .15 acres. I still have 2 units left I need to talk to Tj and see if I should apply more. I did put my measuring stick out last night right after application and checked it this morning about 14 hours later and it seemed to stay the same level but I am not sure if we got any rain. Can’t wait to get home tonight and check it. I will give a better explanation on what I did and the results later

TJ, if you read this, thanks again for your help. I do wonder if you are estimating a bit too aggressively on the amount of product that is needed? Several of us seemed to have at least half (or more than half) left when we applied it at the recommended rates. I had a .20 or .22 acre pond and was told to get 3 units. I used about 1.5, even putting it on heavy to try to get it at the recommended application dose. JoeDK has a smaller pond than mine at .15 acre and was told to buy 3 units as well?

Just wondered if we should have been advised to have about 1/3 less units recommended to start out with.

Not wanting to sound ungrateful as we appreciate what you do and the extra ended up providing me with 2 more applications at later dates which did some additional good too.

Below is the application formula derived following lots of projects over the past 5 years and what several pond management companies [and the manufacturer] recommend - so I borrowed their insight to help formulate the recommendations. The application formula is dependent on the accuracy of data input - daily vertical water loss and treatment area [sq ft]. Nothing I can do from Lincoln to verify that information is accurate, but I've treated all 7 of my ponds and used this same formula. On 3 ponds I had to retreat 2x in the same area because application was too light - so I don't believe [at least in those cases] the formula is an issue.

What I have learned is every pond is different - probably details far beyond our ability to measure which impacts the efficacy of the polymer - but results absolutely vary. I'm pretty transparent that in 5 cases so far the polymer treatment did absolutely NOTHING to improve the leak rate. Pond owner may have missed applying to the leaking area, might have under applied, might have applied it incorrectly - those cases continue to baffle me but I'm working on one right now and it's frustrating for everyone. Bottom line, like in pond management, nothing is certain and pond leaks behave differently - we make our best hypothesis based on the information available and hope for the best. It's not an exact science, and I'm not a scientist, I just try to help however I can as a Pond Boss volunteer.

Bear in mind the manufacturer suggested Joe treat the entire pond and his estimate was 5x higher than the project cost following our several phone calls. All I provide is the formula, the pond owner makes the decision on number of units. I'm grateful for the opportunity to make a new friend and help Joe - hopefully he sees some leak rate improvement [sounds good so far] and I'm sure he's relived saving thousands on the project from the original estimate. I'm not aware of "several" people with polymer surplus on the forum - no one has notified me directly of this. Considering the polymer saves $5-$20k in re-engineering a clay liner I always figured it was better to be safe than sorry by cutting corners, as again, I have under applied on my own projects on the farm.

Up to .25” daily vertical water loss: 1 unit treats 4,000 sq ft
.25” - .50” daily vertical water loss: 1 unit treats 3,500 sq ft
.50” - .75” daily vertical water loss: 1 unit treats 3,000 sq ft
.75” – 1” daily vertical water loss: 1 unit treats 2,500 sq ft

Thanks TJ! the back information and your results with so many happy pondowners continue to show forth on this forum. I never saw the formula you list above in writing so this is very useful. Is the square foot calculation just surface square footage? I would have thought that acre-feet of water, total depth, or the way the bottom is sloped would have something to do with application rates.

I think we all wonder when we apply this how we can apply it thick enough to get best results the FIRST time. No one enjoys the slip and slide in the boat with this greasy stuff
To me, putting it on a bit heavy and having some left over was a fine outcome and I think my leak got better by doing 1 big dose followed by a few smaller applications as 'touchup'

Sq ft of basin, not surface area. It’s a rough calculation and again none of this is exact unless we are treating a dry basin. Speaking of which I have had amazing results treating two dry basins where we stripped the liner to gravel veins, applied dry polymer, and capped with several lifts of high plasticity clay. Both ponds literally sealed like Tupperware, but 99.9% of projects occur in hydrated ponds so our control of the treatment is impacted significantly. Ideally leak identification needs to occur during excavation phase so when suspect materials are encountered one can treat them dry and cap with lifts of good clay. Unfortunately many of us (including myself) weren’t notified by professional performing work of suspect areas or we had no knowledge of treatment options so we hoped for the best and filled the pond....only to learn much later the issues we could have addressed. I will never build a pond again without having a pallet of polymer on hand just to be safe. I’ve dropped easily $50k in engineering and electric costs running well for 13 years trying to keep up with water loss - I could have saved $40k easily just by doing things right in the first place. I hope more Pond Pros become aware of the solutions at their disposal to address suspect material issues upon discovery instead of reliving all our collective nightmares.

Amen to that last comment there TJ..

I’m not mad at all about the extra soilfloc I just brought it up because I wanted to make sure I applied it right. I went by ounces per square feet not units per square feet. Maybe I should of marked off 3000sq ft and applied 1 unit to that I think it would be more 10-15 ounces.

26 hours after application I looked again and the pond did drop 3/8 of an inch. I’d say normally that would be around 5/8. But I’m not sure if it rained last night and today wasn’t near as hot as it has been.
I got few questions. Last night when I went down there about 2 hours after application I reached down to the bottom and could pick up the slime off the bottom and today it is no long there. Should it disappear like that? One spot I noticed when I stirred the mud up there was like little clear balls about the size of a bb that were floating around. The other spot I didn’t notice them.
Second question I read that some times it takes up to seven days to work. Anyone notice this before?
Third question. If I want to apply a second coat on it I’m guessing I should avoid raking this time since it already has a coat on the bottom? And if I apply it to other areas am I ok to rake that to stir up the water?
Just to clarify This pond is 3/4 of an acre we were going to just try and hit the areas that I THINK It’s coming from.
Also I think next time I apply I’m going to have some bentonite on hand to help it sink.
Thanks again for everyone’s help and experience esp TJ

2-4 oz per 10 sq ft.

Cross linked polymer continues to expand over the course of 2 weeks +, keep an eye on vert water loss, it should continue to improve. You may need to retreat, let the water dictate the next move. I'm here anytime to discuss your next moves.

TJ

TJ, when I dig some ponds here I will be applying it to the dry pond basin, hopefully that will work better than applying it to the water in the pond. Sandy soil here, no clay until I hit 20' depth.

After the first week with soilfloc I lost about 2.75 inches of water. A previous week before I applied it I lost about 3.5 inches. The only difference was it was not near as hot last week. The week before when i lost 3.5 it was 100 degrees last week was around 80. Not sure if that had anything to do with it. Another thing I noticed is that I would loose more water at night then I would during the day. I am not sure why that is I would think it would be the opposite. Any one ever seen this? This Is about 3/4 acre pond.

Over the weekend we had a big rain about 4.5 inches. It raised my pond level up about 19 inches (almost full). After the rain the water was real dirty so i decided to apply my last two units to the same area that I applied my first unit to. On the first unit I applied my measurements was off I messed up. I was thinking a 10x10 area needed 4 oz. I did not read it I just assumed. My bad. This time when i applied it I noticed it sank a lot faster I am guessing because of the muddy water. I also found out its a lot easier with a couple people.

I also put a bucket of water out to compare evaporation for this weeks results.

Hopefully it will work. I will let you know results in a couple weeks. Hopefully they are good ones!!!
If any questions or if you had a experience with soilfloc not mention on this forum send me a message I would like to learn
Thanks Joe

Sorry to hear that Joe. BIG difference in 10 square feet and 100 square feet. Hopefully it will work better this time. If you seen a little help with the last one, I would think this one would help a lot more.

An update, the (relatively) short version.
Spring 2020 - excavator took out all trees and used material from bottom of pond to fill in stump holes. Maybe 6" of water in the bottom. Found a seam of rock/sand on west side of pond that extended down at least half way to the bottom.
June 19,2020 - 5+" rain, water going over spillway, pond about 10' deep, then started losing 4 inches a day.
July 10,2020 - put in 1/4 unit of SoilFloc (throwing from the bank) when pond was down to 5' deep and about 2000 square feet, and then was losing about 1/2" a day with some small rains that kept it about 5' deep.
July 27,2020 - 3.70" rain that mostly filled it back up to about 8' deep (7" from top of my measuring post), and put in another 1/4 unit with about 9000 square feet surface area.
July 28, 2020 - another 0.75" rain.
August 1, 2020 - 8" from top of measuring post.
August 16, 2020 - 1/2 unit with pond level 18" from top of measuring post - drop of 10" in 2 weeks.
August 17, 2020 - 0.60" rain, the ONLY rain we had in August.
August 30,2020 - 22" from top of measuring post - drop of 4" in 2 weeks.

The watershed is all hayfield/pasture, about 15 acres worth, with pasture all at least 200 yards away. There is a catch pond that overflows into the main pond only with major rain events, and only a couple of acres that drain directly into the pond. Historically, pond would be dry or with 6" or less depth several months each year. Pond is a triangle, with sides about the same slope as the dam. When tested this summer, pH of 7.0, and nitrites, ammonia, and phosphates were all ZERO. Visibility maybe 18-24". Added a few dozen bait shop minnows on June 30, but haven't YET gotten a minnow trap to see how they are doing.

Will be monitoring until next spring. Pond is currently about 4' below spillway, so may get another unit of SoilFloc to apply in Spring. Would like to see the water level about 2' higher than it is now and am concerned about sand/rock seam on west side. IF water level is maintaining, then will need to start with fish. Am considering minnows, yellow perch, and small mouth bass.

SO FAR, SO GOOD!

Thanks to all forum members who take a moment and express gratitude for my humble efforts to assist in your leak [or other pond management] issues. I'm likewise grateful to meet you, learn about your ponds and goals, and hopefully seek an effective solution together. Over the past 6 years, roughly half the time we've decided to spend nothing and mitigate issues with a little creativity, donated labor and materials, or other outside the box solutions. Yet I always appreciate when you decide to go the polymer route you don't forget about the Pond Boss volunteer [and paid advertiser] and give me a call. I enjoy extending discounts to the Pond Boss family to save you a bit on the project, it's a win-win.

So I have an update on my application: I now believe I have a screwy water-table/ground water pond.

The soilfloc slowed the rate of seepage considerably this summer, knocking the rate of loss from a little less than an inch a day down to around a quarter inch or less a day on average (it was tough to measure). The back of the dam dried up, and in general a big improvement on apparent seepage on the dam. However, the water still dropped down to the same level it has in the past around this time of year, then just stays there. It just took much longer to get there this year. At this point my losses go to bathtub range, but at almost 3' down.

Eventually we will get enough rain (I hope) to get runoff again to top it off. But I think I have seams on the uphill side that go both ways for water flow depending on ground water. I think this is confirmed in the winter when the pond is full since I cannot get thick ice near that side of the pond. I am guessing I always have some amount of water flowing in and out, so I probably wont get Soilfloc to go into a seam where water is coming out.

Any experience with this scenario?

Drat.

Liquidsquid
I wonder if when the pond is at it's fullest and just starting to drop so you know things are flowing out, then treat it again with soilfloc. I would think if you could get it to seal up enough to keep it higher than the trouble area that the pressure would keep the flow going out instead of in.
Also maybe it would be worth trying to pump a little more water out while it's at the level that it holds steady, to see if it comes back up on it's own or not, so you'll know for sure if it flows both ways. Maybe you're just getting below the troubled areas?

I haven't read every post on this thread, but I had a question. Can SoilFloc be used to keep clay particles "trapped" on the bottom of a pond, so they don't redistribute into the water column? I'm going to have a lot of exposed clay with steep runoff hills nearby on my pond that's almost completed, and I worry that it's going to be constantly muddy until I get some grass growing (and probably some erosion mats, or geotextile fabric).

Steve, I've probably read every post on Soilfloc i can find. I could be wrong but I think it will help settle what is already in the pond at the time of treatment and maybe even help hold it down some until it gets disturbed. I don't think it will do anything for new stuff coming in after treatment.

The linear polymer is a flocculant and binds with suspended clay particles and drops to pond basin and, depending on the treatment area/application amount, can have a major impact on clarity. On one of my micro ponds [.2 AC] my visibility went from 18" to 9' overnight following polymer treatment. I have some PB family who order the linear polymer [floc] to clear their ponds annually as for them it's more readily available [quick email to me], cheaper, and easier/safer to apply than alum which always requires a hydrated lime treatment to buffer the PH drop. Hydrated lime isn't much fun it's highly caustic - ask Rex Rains for some photos of his arms almost burned to the bone! Good times. I wouldn't recommend alum/lime treatments unless using an experienced pro, like I did, with Rex.

Steve - your new pond will be turbid for a while, so I'd focus my efforts and budget on straw mats and getting seed down and keeping it as moist between rains ASAP. Contact your local pros for recommendations on the quickest seed to germinate for the specific season and region you'll plant and include some warm and cool season grasses as well to germinate later. For us in NE Russian Wheat, Annual Rye, and Oats pop fast but in the Fall I like fescue blends and always include some warm season natives like Big/Litte Bluestem, Indiangrass, Switchgrass, etc. to germinate later. I love sedges, rushes and arrowhead as emergent and shoreline vegetation as it spreads fast and really helps stabilize shorelines from wave action.

When your pond is completed perform jar test to determine you don't have an ionic imbalance. We don't see those too often around the forum, and I suspect you'll be OK without having to consider managing turbidity outside of getting your watershed established ASAP. I'm always here to chat about watershed management as I've done it dozens of times now and figured out every way to screw it up - email me anytime buddy happy to help my PB family.

tj@hudlandmgmt.com

Sounds like many have used soilfloc with good results. Does the amount of muck on the bottom impact how well the product works?


Now for my funny, but expensive story on how my leak developed.

Bought house with a .75 acre pond on it in 2005. About 40 feet to the east is a small creek that everyone has run there overflow to. When we arrived there was a basic 12 inch corrugated pipe that carried the overflow to the creek. Happy with what seemed like a healthy pond in place my wife wanted to build an inground pool slightly downgrade from the pond (really the best place for it) so that work was completed and while I was concerned with the pool being down grade of the pond I felt pretty good that the 12 inch corrugated would keep rising water going where we wanted it (to the creek, not the pool).

Anyhow, 1 day after the pool was completed the remnants of Katrina made the trek to southern Ohio which is where I am at. We watched in horror as the 12 inch pipe could not keep up with the rising water, yep, the 1 day old pool, down grade of the pond took on quite a bit of the ponds overflow. When the rains stopped and the chore of clean up began we found blue gill and water snakes happily swimming in the 1 day old pool. Amazingly, flocculent for the pool and lots of vacuuming had the pool looking good again about 3 days later.

So, what does that have to do with a leak, right?

Well, we never wanted to have another situation where the overflow could not be driven to the creek because of capacity issues so we had an engineer come out and assess our overflow structure. The recommendation to improve capacity was to add a concrete bulkhead and catch basin surrounded by rip rap with one 24 inch corrugated pipe running out to the creek. We were told only a 500 year flood could ever cause that size overflow to not be able to handle the rising water. If we wanted to go overboard they could run a staggered set of 2 side by side 24 inch corrugated pipes to the creek. The costs was not that much more so we had the concrete bulkhead, catch basin, rip rap, and 2 24inch diameter pipes put in. When they were done it looked freaking great and more importantly was functional.

So, what does that have to do with a leak, right?

Well, 2 years after having everything set up and running great my grand son was out fishing with us when I notice a build up of leafy debris in the catch basin. It was Summer time, and the material was dry and I noticed snakes going in and out of the leaf debris. I hate snakes of any type (sorry snake lovers) and I didn't want to risk my grandson inadvertently getting bit even if they were non poisonous. Here is where the fateful decision occurred. 1. Do I get a rake and rake the leaves out of the basin or get the blower and blow them down the 24 inch pipes OR 2. Do I drop a match on the leaves because fire is a great tool and instead of moving the leaves I get rid of them altogether and perhaps burn out a few snakes at the same time. I made the wrong decision, I dropped the match and began walking away, approximately 15 seconds later it sounded like a bomb went off (methane had built up in the corrugated causing the explosion), I looked over and the corrugated pipe was on fire, the bulk head and catch basin were cracked. I fully expected that the ground had shaken so bad a leak would develop, a big leak. I watched closely over the next few weeks and while the pond held water the level did drop to about 6 inches lower than the bottom of the catch basin, fortunately it did not drop lower.

Since then I have not been able to find a single contractor in this area willing to dig out the old and replace with new. When the water does come up now it runs UNDER the corrugated pipes instead of through it because the explosion separated where the pipes abuted the catch basin. The snakes I had hope to rid now use the gap below the corrugated pipe and the sinking ground running out to the creek as their get away paths. Snakes 1 Human 0

For me, step 1 is getting the old basin, bulk head, and pipes out and replaced with new. Hopefully during that process I will be able to remedy the ground in that area to hold any leakage through the board.

Probably one of my greatest regrets in life was dropping that match. I think God was sending me a message, even snakes are his creatures and I had to be taught a lesson.

Pictures available upon request 😀

We got perfect conditions last week before leaving on vacation: Full pond, warm water, no wind, 1.5 units to be used. This time I tried applying to a side where theory has it there is a leaky interface between hard-pan subsoil and the excavated soil as it angles downhill.
Dumped quite a lot on that side with help from neighbors. Came back and it looks to have made an improvement! This may have been the culprit for the majority of the leaking. Only longer-term watching will give me any decent answers.

Today it is raining again, so I wont get a good read on leak rate, but having a full pond this time of year is rare so I am thrilled.

The skeeters are enjoying all this rain though :-(, making it rather difficult to spend any time there.

Getting kind of excited. Lost a whole 1/4" of water over a period of a WEEK. Yes, you read right, from losing near an inch a day to 1/4" in a week! Perhaps there is ground water making it in that I cannot see keeping things abnormally high after all the rain we had, but this is significant. It has been in the 80's and dry as well, so frankly I am shocked. This stuff WORKS.

More time will tell the real story as we go through one of our driest months: August.

The first attempt on the main downhill side of the dam improved things a bit, roughly slowed leaking to about 1/2 of what it was. (Earlier posts in this thread) I went from an a bit less than an inch a day, to a little less than 1/3 inch a day. The pond would still drain down about 3' in two months of summer to about the same point as before treating. Rain or no rain. Just took longer to get there.

This second application along the damn that follows the downhill slope on the "side" seems to be a major improvement. I assumed there is a junction/seam between undisturbed base soils (very low leakage) and the excavated soils which make the dam, creating a channel for water. No keyway was created/packed on this side, it was just run over with a dozer a few times, which we know is designed NOT to compact.

In addition, the cattails on the main dam are slowly fading away as they no longer have a steady seep of water to thrive on from the first application. I need to check the neighbor's "spring" that appeared in the middle of their field after we built the pond to see if it dried up with this latest application. The family renting that field for Soybeans are none too pleased with a tire eater out there.

Maybe I will finally be able to get my waterlilies to thrive instead of them drying up at the end of summer.

Good job liquidsquid!

Hopefully the skeeters won't like it when the backside of the dam gets all dried out now that you have apparently stopped the leak.

That's great news!!!

If my new pond does not seal up, I me need to try soilfloc as well. I am very unsure on this one.

Apart from being messy if it is damp out or it is too hot to wear a painters disposable outfit and you sweat, the stuff just disappears after a day or two. Seemingly no effect on the wildlife, including my very large resident water snake (non-poisonous, so it gets to stay).

I found also the best way to clean up is just jump in the untreated end of the pond and rinse off by swimming around a bit. Using the hose takes forever, and if your well water is chilly like ours, rather unpleasant. You DON'T want to shower if on a septic system covered with dust, as I cannot imagine something that is meant to plug up soils is even remotely a good idea to get down the drain. I used a inflatable rowboat to apply, and letting it rain on it, then dry in the sun gets it fairly well cleaned up as it flakes off.

My ropes on the other hand; fine until they get wet. Use old rope or cheap stuff you can toss.

Thanks for all of that detailed advice on actually USING the soilfloc!

For more detail of how I applied. YMMV.

Supplies:
Use 5mil or thicker disposable Nitrile gloves. Easier clean up, and if you get too slippery to hold stuff, switch out the gloves.
Use N95 masks (you should have plenty kicking about now). No good to get dust in your lungs.
Safety glasses or goggles, you don't want dust in your eyes or rub your eye. Very hard to get out. It wont hurt you, but annoying.
If too hot for a full suit, wear cloths you can chuck out.
Bare feet or wool socks. You will slip about in the boat, water shoes, or sandals, so kneeling is best. Knee pads that you use for gardening will help.
If you must cross 50' of water, get two lengths of 50' rope and two helpers. 100' need 2x100' lengths (etc). Tie each to ether end of the boat. Each helper will keep the boat positioned absolutely.
I used two of those large feed buckets to hold parts A and B on either end of the boat, easier to access and much less spill than a 5 gallon bucket.
People have used Solo cups, they collapse easily. I found using large plastic drinking glasses, one color or well marked for each type for throwing (A & B). Textured plastic will help keep a grip on the cup.
I tried using a spreader, but a single drop of water on the spreading mechanism ends the project as it gums up. Mine lasted abut 5 minutes as I splashed it to get in the boat. Went and got cups.

Applying:
I started from the shoreline, probably 12 feet away, and worked up and down the shoreline. You want to give yourself plenty of room to throw hard and wide. Don't get it on the shoreline. The further out and wide you can spread a pair of cups full, the better. If not, it glops up too much and captures air and floats. the goal is to sink it. A good throw will allow you to A/B an area (A first, B directly on top), then A/B half over a thrown area and into a new area (layering). You can tell when you have a good application when a light coating of material stays on top without sinking right away. Have your helpers move you in your throw widths when you ask.
I worked 4 passes, about 10' further out each. Then I worked my way back in and addressed areas that looked a little light on application. In total about an area 50x40' for a 1.5 units.

Notes:
Part A is snot, part B is gel clumps.
Part A will continue to swell and spread over the surface making the treated area look much larger than where you threw, but I assume it is a minority of un-sunken material.
Warm water it sinks faster, making it more difficult to track where you threw. Cold water it hangs around longer.
Algae in clear water will form on some material and lift it up with O2 bubbles a few days later. I doubt that is an issue, but if you have lots of bubbly algae, it may be best to treat the area several days ahead of time.

"but if you have lots of bubbly algae, it may be best to treat the area several days ahead of time."

You mean treat the area with an algaecide several days ahead of time?

Hey all, new here.

So I dug a small pond earlier this summer on my back pasture but it won't hold water. I dug a couple test holes prior to digging and found clay but after digging the pond the ground appeared much more silty and rocky than I was hoping. Not huge, it's about 20 feet wide, 70 feet long and 5 feet deep. After filling it up full it drained completely in a little over a week so I re-dug the overflow pipe and tried packing it in better and now tonight (weather pending) I'm going to apply soilfloc. I bought 55lbs of part A and 55lbs of partB; my plan is to turn the fill pump off while applying and wait about an hour afterwards and then turn it back on. My thought is I don't want the water level to fall too much before the soilfloc has a chance to settle. It's cold water too as it's mostly from a mountain stream. Does that sound feasible? Thanks in advance for any thoughts.

Yes, correct.

Of note, pond at full pool two weeks after our last significant rain. Leak appears to have slowed even more, though I do have inflow from a shallow stream. This will be the first fall ever I don't need to retrieve my float raft out from 3' down.

Update:

So it's definitely leaking slower now that I got an application of soilfloc on . . it appears the bottom is pretty well sealed off but I'd like to get another treatment and attempt to seal off the walls better . . is two weeks between treatments enough time? I want to clear some of the grasses out around the top of the sides as well before I put another 100+ lbs in. Probably leaking around 1/2 inch every 2 hours now; I'd be real happy if my sump pump only had to run once a day going forward instead of a couple times.

I was going to make a new thread, but I guess I'll just add to this one. I had a question regarding SoilFloc and its ability to treat turbidity as it's being applied. I have read about DamIt, another polymer product, and it says on their website that it does create a chemical charge that grabs onto suspended particles and sinks them, similar to the effects of aluminum sulfate. Does SoilFloc also do this? Part 2 of my question pertains to the substrate that it can be applied to. In my new pond, heavy rains have eroded away lots of my bank and a noticeable gravel vein has been revealed. Will any of the polymers work in such a situation? I want to nip these problems in the bud before my pond gets any fuller, if possible.

Hi Steve

Damit, ESS 13, DB 100 are linear polymers - one part treatment. Linear polymers act as flocculants just like Alum or Gypsum - polymer is cationic (positive charged ion) which attracts anionic (negative charged ion) clay and organic particles, bind, and sink them to pond bottom. This action often results in improving clarity depending on the application amount.

I've worked with one part polymers multiple times over the past 7-8 years and have had partial success - but nothing compared to using two part polymers. Several reasons I won't ever use one part, linear polymers again are:

They require denser application - resulting in much higher treatment cost
Product is more expensive by volume - again, resulting in much higher treatment cost
ESS 13 shades water grey for 4-6 weeks, photosynthesis ceases, often resulting in DO crash and fishery fill event
Linear polymers alone do not address leak issues like sand, gravel, shale, rock, etc. - they merely act as a soil conditioner which often has zero affect on leak rate
My personal experience using single part linear polymers [including data from my clients and resellers] places their success rate about 25% - that's far too low to justify the expense

I use two part polymers - Soilfloc is one I used for years but I have found the same polymer product which is cheaper by volume and freight cost as it's not coming from San Diego like Soilfloc. The two part polymer treatment uses linear polymer described above but includes a cross linked polymer treatment also. The CL polymer is designed to be pulled into the fissure[s] by the current of the leak and over the course of 3-4 weeks expands 300x its original size. The crosslinked polymer addresses voids created by gravel, sand, poorly compacted soil, clay with foreign materials [organic, etc], rock, shale, etc. My success rate working with two part polymer treatments are 90% - reducing leak rate by 50% or better. I've been using the new two part polymer for a couple years now on 200+ projects and couldn't be happier saving folks money on treatment and freight.

It's counter intuitive the two part polymer is cheaper, but also significantly more effective. I wonder often how those other polymers stay in business.

As a volunteer here on Pond Boss I am happy to walk through anyone's issues and provide recommendations - I love working on pond construction, rehab, and leak resolution. As always my time is free to my Pond Boss family and if you end up going the polymer route I'd love to save you money on the treatment budget, too. It's always appreciated when the PB family throws a little business the way of the moderator volunteer, too!

I'm an email away anytime - ping me if you want to chat, Steve. Hope some of this was helpful!

tj@hudlandmgmt.com

TJ, this is the first I've heard of the new product. Can you tell us more about it?

Thank you, TJ. That definitely gives me something to think about. I've been watching videos, both good and bad, and I've seen quite a few people have great success with one-part polymers such as DamIt, and it's around 1/3 of the cost of SoilFloc iirc. The one thing about DamIt that appealed to me was the fact they say you can apply it to dry ground before the pond fills up. Can SoilFloc do that?

I'm not in full panic mode yet, but I definitely have some concerns regarding the current and future integrity of my pond. Luckily it's a small pond, so if I go the polymer route, I should only need 1 unit (of part A and part B) of SoilFloc to treat it.

With anything that you apply to the dry ground, you have to incorporate it into the ground then when the pond fills you have to make dang sure the inflowing water doesn't scour that away. i.e. if you use a hose to fill the pond or a pipe, have the water splash out onto a big tarp so it doesn't erode the ground as it flows into the pond. If it does, more than likely you can have a leak in that spot.

With SoilFloc, if that does happen, all you have to do is apply some over that area once the pond is full.

Steve - you should verify with Damit application amount [volume] and product cost plus freight [comes from Australia] and we can compare numbers. Last time I ran into them on a project their cost was 5x higher, client went for it, did nothing for his leak [see reasons above], and we resolved the leak issue for $500. Lesson learned I guess. I won't use single treatment polymers [linear] alone when I can double the insurance with two part polymers at a fraction of the cost.

It's the same two part polymer produced in the same factory but cuts out marketing costs, middle men/resellers/brokers, and freight is significantly cheaper as it's not shipped from the West Coast. The product and freight cost savings is passed directly to my PB family - every little bit helps!

Thanks TJ!

I did some number-crunching, to see what the different costs are between DamIt and SoilFloc.

1 15L Pail of DamIt costs $257.56 and treats 1614 sq ft, for a cost-per-sqaure-foot of 15.9 cents.

1 55 pound supply (27.5 pounds of Part A, and 27.5 pounds of Part B) costs $345 and treats 1750 sq ft for a cost-per-square-foot of 19.7 cents.

So DamIt is 19.3% cheaper than SoilFloc. These are only estimates, of course, as you may need more or less, depending on the size of your leak(s). Obviously, if SoilFloc is that much better and reliable, then it's worth spending the extra money on it.

Steve, I have used soilfloc before. One unit used to be around $550.00 and breaks down into 4, 5 gallon buckets. One 15l bucket of Damit is about 4 gallons, so it would take 5 buckets of Damit to equal 1 unit of soilfloc,, dry material, that would be about $1300.00(damit price) . It states that damit will cover more sq ft, but I don't see how. I confess, I have used a pail of damit before, I applied it with a seed spreader, It didn't go very far.

Your math is correct, but I'll provide some different data for you.

1 unit of the two part polymer I'm using is $450. That's 55# linear, 55# crosslinked - 110#/ unit.

1 unit treats up to 4,000 sq ft. [application rate depends on daily vertical water loss - we're usually between 3000-4000].

Dammit is a linear polymer - linear polymers are not designed to address gravel, sand, rock etc. - that's where the crosslinked polymer shines.

Another factor to consider is freight...if Dammit is coming from AU I'm assuming it's more expensive than my polymer shipping from the Midwest. Freight averages $75-$150 for most projects depending on location and weight.

I've worked directly on 50 projects in NE [application] and consulted on 500+ more nationwide and have experience with all the pond sealing polymers available on the market. There's a reason I now use what I use - 90% success rate blows everything out of the water, and at a fraction of the price.

Always appreciate when the PB family allows me to help them resolve seepage issues - it's great way to expand my Pond Boss family and for members to support Pond Boss sponsors/volunteer moderators who help make this forum a free resource for all, too!

I'm always a call away - my time is free, happy to help walk through scenarios with anyone. Leaking ponds stink - help is available.

So what's the name of this new miracle polymer and how do we get it?

It’s not a new polymer, it’s the same polymer we’ve been using for several years, it’s just cheaper now through these new relationships. I have been providing volunteer consulting for the forum for many years and I can help line up your options - if polymer is the best solution for your budget and goals then we'll tackle the project together. I’m just an email away - happy to chat about leaks, fishery or pond management, stocking strategies, rehab, etc. - my time is always free to my PB family, for anything, and always will be. I’ve made every costly mistake possible and can help you avoid my failures.

Tj@hudlandmgmt.com

TJ-

I've just read through this entire thread. Very interesting. Initially I was looking at Damit but now I'm sold on the 2 part polymer in case I need it.

I have a 1 acre lot on a slope overlooking the Arkansas river in Broken Arrow, OK. A lot of sandy soil to say the least. 1/4 of my property is a deep and steep 'canyon' about 30ft wide with steep walls on either side. I'm having a contractor come in a week to excavate about a 100ft x 30ft strip through that canyon, using the best material he can find there to berm up the end. He'll install 2 culvert pipes in the dam as overflow. I have 10 drains from various ground catch basins and downspouts that collect at this one area, water from much of my neighbors' lots and my lot. So I get a lot of water drainage that moves through there. Instead of watching the canyon get deeper and wider, I thought I'd build a little pond.

Can you get me started on a plan for what to watch for and when to possibly act on treating with the polymer?

Thank you,

Steve

Hi Steve:

I help folks nationwide seal leaking ponds and my time is free to my Pond Boss Forum Family. Feel free to reach out any time - happy to help however I can.

tj@hudlandmgmt.com
402.730.4897

Sent you an email.

There is a decorative PVC film pond on the property, which is leaking a lot - somewhere torn. Our neighbors covered the pond with thick polyethylene film. It lasted three years.
I was thinking, if the pond is leaking - maybe it's better to pump out the water, dry it out and see if the damage is not critical, then seal it with a suitable sealant https://sealwithease.com/concrete-sealer/.
Another question: can I top it with something else, less expensive, for a 32.81-foot pond?
Will a thick plastic sheeting hold the water?

Thick sheeting should work for awhile. However it is succeptible, over time, to sunshine.

Interested in what TJ is selling, I will get an email off this weekend, thanks; Ed

The polymers work very well.

BTL (Bend Tarp Liner) makes lightweight liners that are guaranteed for 10 to (I believe) 25 years UV rating. They last a LOT longer than that if you cover them with soil. They also don't require a goetextile fabric underlayment. The thinnest one is very lightweight, I had them spec out one for a 1.25 acre pond and it weighed around 4,000 pounds - all one piece.