Pond Boss Forums POND CONSTRUCTION Building a dam breaking and rebuilding a dam

I have a 2-1/2 acre pond that is creek fed. The pond is about 30 years old. It was so full of silt that we could no longer take care of the weeds and moss. All of the fish had died off also. Last fall i had a friend with an escavator dig me a 10 foot wide ditch through the dam clear down to clay and drained the pond. Now that we have all of the silt cleaned out, What is the best way to seal the dam back up?

I cut the dam on a 60 or 70 year old pond I own about three years ago and will be attempting to seal that dam back up in another couple years - focusing on finishing / improving my small lake right now. If you get any good pointers, please share them.

I know it can be done though as a neighbor did it about two years ago with his 2 - 3 acre pond and I don't think they did anything special.

Again, I'm with Rangersedge. I have the same problem. Don't have an answer but would love to hear some answers!
I think most of the pond xperts are very busy about now and not on the web.

Why not siphon the water out and then use a track hoe? I think you might do better. I know you guys have already broke the dam but as you are attempting a fix, I'd keep a large siphon or pump handy.

We tried to siphon out the water. We even used pumps. But i have a constant water flow, and we just could not keep the water out of the pond. I fought it for 6 months, got really sick of it and called my friend with the excavator. First problem solved!! I think we are going to clean out the pond silt, groom all the banks, and then we will dig a deeper hole in the center of the pond for all of the water to gather while we close up the damb. Just a thought!

Can you divert the creek water or build what I believe is called a coffer dam? Grooming mud is hell.

posted April 23, 2004 07:21 PM
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Dave:

In the particular situation of my old pond... I wanted to accomplish several different things.

First, I wanted to let a hord of tresspassers know that the pond was drained. People were coming from 30 miles away and walking a mile to fish this pond. I figured letting them drive that far and walk into a drained, grown up pond was good for them. ;-)

Second, I wanted to do a major overhaul with regard to the pond design and etc. The pond dam had trees on it probably three feet in diameter and several feet of siltation / muck on the bottom.

Third, I wanted to start completely from zero in restocking it.

Fourth, I already owned a trackhoe and it was expeditious. Rest assured though, there is no way I'm going to cut through the dam of my new pond just because I have a trackhoe handy! ;-)

Jeff
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Posts: 119 | From: Illinois | Registered: May 2003 | IP: Logged

Rangersedge
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Member # 584

posted April 23, 2004 07:22 PM
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Oops! Must have hit new topic instead of reply to breaking the dam thread. Can someone move this to that thread and then delete this one? Thanks! Jeff
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Posts: 119 | From: Illinois | Registered: May 2003 | IP: Logged

Ric Swaim
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Member # 523

Member Rated:
posted April 23, 2004 08:36 PM
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Rangersedge,
You can highlight your post right click & copy open a reply window in the other thread right click & paste.
Since you started this thread you can delete it.

[ April 23, 2004, 08:37 PM: Message edited by: Ric Swaim ]

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Ric

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Posts: 318 | From: Surry Co NC | Registered: Apr 2003 | IP: Logged

Dave Davidson
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Member # 61

Member Rated:
posted April 25, 2004 10:13 PM
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Jeff, I love your idea about letting trespassers walk a long way for nothing. You have a very admirable mean streak.
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Posts: 528 | From: Hurst & Bowie Texas | Registered: Apr 2002 | IP: Logged

Softail: Good luck with that pond. My current plans for my old pond are to take off the topsoil down to where the tree roots are no longer evident across the entire dam so they don't rot in the dam. I'll then probably cut a core trench of sorts in the dam and across the cut out area with the trackhoe. Then pack that core trench as tightly as possible with the trackhoe bucket. Then fill in / pack the cut out area as good as possible. All with good clay. My old pond doesn't have a lot of drainage so it will probably take some time to fill in so the dam will have time to settle before full pressure against it.

Ric: Thanks!

Dave: Yep!

I just had a guy come out and look at cleaning out my pond. He said that a coffer dam was the right way to do this. We also found that my original drain pipe is rusted out the whole 150 foot. We will have to dig this out also. The good thing is its only 10 foot from the trench we dug origaninally. So they can get a two tractor width when they go to pack the clay. My question is, plastic pipe or galvanized pipe for my main overflow and coffer dam? And should i use a T on both of them?

Get a hold of ray scott (its easier than you think) yes the bass guy. He has tapes out on building ponds and lakes and how to redo old ones. I have the taped they are like 80.00 and are very informative. If I remember there is also a website I believe under his name where you can ask him questions like this site. Try looking it up could be helpful and good luck.

softail,

I'm in the process of designing my pond, Watershed is approx 112 acres, going with the siphon system and emergency spillway. Experts can give you pros and cons, but main one I see is you don't have pipe deteriorating at the base of your dam.

Pedro: I don't know where you are with your pond construction, but my biggest regret on mine is that I didn't have a pipe installed in the bottom of my dam. I know there are risks and that is why I didn't. Now that I've learned more, I would install a pipe if I could easily do it over.

I just finished the process of digging out 40 year old pond that was filled with silt. The dam was broke in the first year. By the time we started removing the silt, we had dug two trenches through the pond to divert the water. The first trench diverted a small spring fed creek/water way, and the second diverted a spring that only appeared after an LGP Dozer pushed its way into a hole.

The dam was put back much like the process described above. Core trench and clay. After the dam was put back together, we used a large qty of dirt on the back side of the dam to widen the top and create a 3or 4-1 pitch.

Problems encourtered: 1. The pond was a lot deeper than the contractor originally thought. This $5000 project went from 3-4 days to $19300 and 2 1/2 weeks. 2. The mud in the bottom of the pond would have never dried out due to the springs which are now filling the pond. 3. Trucks couldn't get close enough to the Hoe for easy loading, so a dozer was run constantly to push muuuuud to the hoe.

Overall I am happy witht this project, witht the excepion of the unexpected expense. We restructured the dam, the banks, and placed earthen habitat throughout the pond.

I am now examining another possible issue that I will create a new post titled: "seepage or ground water".

Kevin