I'm new to the forum so I hope this is in the right place. I learned of this forum through another forum I frequent and it seems to be a good place.

My parents recently bought some and that had 3 small ponds on it. They drained the 2 smallest ones (.09acre and .17 acre) to enlarge them. I won't get into the details of the 3rd pond as we call that the black lagoon. The smallest one was somewhat clear to begin with, but had a lot of weeds in it. The other one wasn't clear water but had so much growth in it it looked like low land with no water.

We all figured the clear one might have been spring fed but after draining and enlarging, going deeper too, the spring fed theory was busted as both ponds stayed dry for a couple of months. Recently the area had heavy rain and water began to hold in the ponds. They are maybe 10-15% full now. The water in the pond that was clear to begin with is a clearer blue water and the other pond is a murky muddy brown.

My question is, why would this one pond be able to keep the water clear but the other 2 ponds on the property not? The two ponds in question are a little over 600ft apart in a pasture. The clear water pond has 2 trees near it but in an open pasture, the other pond has about 4 to 5 trees spread around it on the edge of 2 pastures.

Welcome to the best forum on the www.. :-))
If the ponds have no fish, soil type and shoreline exposure will be a factor in water color. Clays of differing types are often layered and can have different colors but I would suspect that one pond may be more prone to surface disturbance against the shore than the other.
Can you confirm no fish?
Also, how did you perform the seal? what equipment was used for compaction?

Lots of aquatic weeds will tend tie up nutrients in the water keeping plankton algae blooms down so will have clear water.

No fish in the ponds, yet. The one pond that has and had clearer water is going to be the fishing pond. It was dug out like a bowl in that it has a sloping bank all the way around. The other pond is going to be used as an irrigation pond. It was dug out like a pool in that it's walled sides with one side being sloped bank.

I'm not sure how they compacted it or if they even sealed it. I wasn't around for much and only saw them using a dozer in the "bowl" pond and an excavator in the irrigation pond. Honestly I'm not sure they did seal it with anything. Im not to confident my parents did a lot of research on pond renovations or the guy that did it. I guess time will tell if it holds water.

I was just finding it weird that 2 ponds roughly 600ft apart could have such different water qualities.

I have a 3 acre pond, two different one acre ponds, a 1/10th acre pond and a 1/20th acre pond.

They all are situated within 1/8th of a mile of each other, and every one has its own character. None of them are alike. Even the fish biting can be different one to another.

That is one advantage to having multiple ponds over one single large pond. If you screw one up, you still got a chance with the others!

I really like multiple ponds.

snrub - I say the same thing about having 4 kids.

JRT, welcome to PB. It all goes to different soil types. I have 4 ponds. Only the 2 larger ones make it through Texas summers. The others are for the hogs to wallow around in.