I have a small, 1/2 acre pond which was old when I was young. It is spring fed, and never dries out, but it is also in a valley that can get a lot of water during rains. (Think 10-30 cfs, could be triple that in a gully washer.)
About 50, maybe 60, years ago the State put a highway through the middle of our property and the pond filled with mud. They cleaned it out, but shortly afterwords the dam washed out on one side. (The bottom is solid rock, and it washed down to a rock ledge on one side.) It was not a big deal at the time, as the pond still had 5-8' of water in it.
Now it is full of silt and only has about 1 foot of water, then muck that is at least 4 feet deep (I tried driving down a rod through the muck but I couldn't get to where I think it is the deepest.) The old dam is full of trees, and the down stream banks have filled in with trees and silt as well for at least 50 to 100 feet. To cut a drain would require cleaning out all the timber and a long ditch, complicated by who knows what boulders, rocks, channels in the old stream bed.
I'd like to clean it out, fix the break, and raise the water level about 3-5 feet so it can be seen from the house. Maybe restock the fish that were lost years ago.
How do you drain it? What is this likely to cost? Give me some clues on how to get started?
