I have a pond (about 1.5 acres) in East Texas that has taken on alot of water over the past 2 years. It is primarily runoff, although water runs continually out of the pond through my overflow pipes (without lowering the pond levels) so there might have a spring. I bought the place almost 3 years ago and the pond is about 10 years old. During the past two springs we have had an unbelievable amount of rain. The first year the creek ran into the pond without a sand bar, the second year we had a sand bar forming at the mouth of the creek and got larger with each rainfall. This year the sand bar has continued to grow and has rerouted the creek into my pond and has formed a sand beach across the entire mouth area reaching 15-20 feet into the pond. I need some advice and possibly some professional help (my wife has been telling me I have needed professional help for years, but that's another topic). Thanks for any suggestions.
Any way to redirect it? This isn't real good.
Dig a smaller pond (sediment pond) that is easily cleaned out 1x year. That will trap the sand before it reaches the main pond. Plan on cleaning out that smaller pond once a year, or you will be draining/renovating the big pond sooner than you'd like.
Thank you both for the advice. There is no way to re-direct as it is a pretty deep run-off creek that comes into the upper end of the pond. A sediment pond may be a possibility although the terrain gets fairly steep on that end. I know there was a quality pond builder in east Texas that has been mentioned many times on this forum, but I can't remember his name. If anyone has a recommendation, I would appreciate it.
imd59, I had a similar problem with sand entering the pond with the heavy downpours we have here in E Texas the past couple of year. So I rented a nice sized track hoe and built the sediment pond myself. Cost was around 2200, I had it for about 3 weeks, billing, went on hr used for a 40 hr work week. My point is, I am no heavy equipment guy but I got it done, and it catches most all of the sand and I now raise fathead minnows in it. Win, Win, I built in an overflow that runs into the big pond, after the sand settles out. I may get by with cleaning all the sand out every 3 or 4 years. Hope this helps.
Tracy
PS, I don't think the cost of rental for clean out will come anywhere near the first time rental
Thanks, Tracy. How many total hours did you put on the track hoe. I got a guy I have used on my driveway that charges me by the hour. He has plenty of equipment to do this job, but wanted to have an idea of how many hours it might take. How large is our fishing pond and how large is your sediment pond?
Lynn
Lynn, I used the track hoe on several projects during that rental so I may not be exact on the time for building a 35x35x10' pond with overflow, but I would say maybe 15 hrs +-. Rental works good if you have several projects. And I always have several projects lol. The biggest problem was having steep shoreline to reduce plant growth but yet have compaction close to the grounds surface to reduce seepage. I used some Soilfloc purchased from TJ here for the seepage where I could not pact the clay as well as it should have been packed. Product worked pretty good so far. Hope this helps
Tracy