Hello, My first posting here in the Forums. I'm a new pond owner here is south central NC. My pond is probably about 75 years old, about an acre. Time and runoff has caused quite a bit of sandy silt to runoff and accumulate along the south and north side banks out to about thirty feet from shore on the south side, depth is about a foot and twenty feet out from the north side, same depth, a foot...Deepest part of the pond is about 8 feet max at center. I would like to dredge it out but honestly, I am hearing big $$, as in thousands... to bring in a private company to do so. Given the modest size of this pond, I was hoping to leverage the knowledge of the more experienced pond owners in this forum. Suggestions?

Welcome to the forum, Rick - great to hear from you!

Shallow ponds provide some management issues, huh? I'm sure you have quite a bit of vegetation dominating the 1' water for several months of the year? Not very productive water.

I am not experienced with the dredging process keeping the pond full and fishery in tact, but imagine it would be expensive. Depending on the quality of your fishery, you may want to consider draining and peforming sediment removal/pond restructuring while dry. It's much cheaper and simpler with dry clay I would imagine, and 1 acre isn't too much to drain and rework.

If you are open to draining most of the pond and working to improve depth, here's an idea of how I would approach it.

1. Check watershed for source of siltation during runoff periods. Consider building a small siltation pond which serves to slow down runoff, allows the particulates to settle, then the water moves into your main BOW with far less turbidity/silt/matter. This will slow down the siltation process for you in the future.

2. Pump the pond down to 3' in deepest area, seine fish and relocate quality fish permanently or for restocking in your BOW later. Pump it dry at that time if you want to work on depth in that portion of the pond, too.

3. Allow the pond to dry - will take some time as silt is notorious for remaining pretty soupy for a long period of time. Excavator might be a better tool than Dozer for this work. Recreate the depths you want and have your habitat plans in order to place prior to refilling the bow [rocks, trees, pvc, etc.].

4. Refill the pond and start fishery over from scratch or with the advanced fish you saved from your original fishery.

While draining, seining, then reworking the pond might seem drastic, it's probably the cheapest manner in which to re-engineer your BOW. Just my take - others will be along to share their insights soon.

Again, welcome to the forum!

PS: We love photos...any shots of your place? What kind of fishery exists now? What are your goals for a new fishery?

If you have room on the otherside of your dam you save $ by having your excavater make a pool to slop your silt and muck in till it drys. Then just spread it out... alot cheaper then paying to remove it. Also make sure you dont dig into your clay base.

I would pump pond down about 4 feet and let sit or keep it pumped down for 30 days then find an area within the pond that you can dig a deep hole and leave a dam between existing water and new hole. Let settle until water is fairly clear in new hole and then dig a ditch from existing water to new hole and transfer water and fish to new hole. Then you can pump rest of way down and dig with long reach Exc or drag line.
Dredging is slow, uses very expensive and high maintenence equipment and the soil you remove takes forever to dry and if you pump into a silt pond will be like quicksand for years.

what to use to pump the level down? a trash pump??, also my drain pipe is plugged and looks about 75 years old... the other side of the dam is well sloped into the woods with alot of area to pump out sand and silt.

Trash pump is good for this type of work.