Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Before and After

This is the before and after pics of a pond that I had built almost 2 years ago. NRCS was supposed to help with the layout and design, but back out at the last minute. I decided to go ahead with the construction since the equipment was already on site. The pond, as you can see, is on a creek and is about 1/4 mile in length. The dock sits about midway.

Squeeky,

What reason did they give you for backing out and what state are you in? How large is the pond? It's really hard to judge size sometimes in pictures.

Looks great!

NRCS told my contractor that the contributing watershed might be to large. Maybe, the challenge was just to much for them. Later, they admitted that the project was feasible, but would require more time for them to study it.

...very tongue in cheek, but it looks like a standard ACoE project on smaller scale; backing up a flowage to create a water empoundment. This is real interesting, Squeeky. You gotta give us some spec's and history. It looks so dang natural, you would never know that it was man-made.
Questions: presuming you own the property on both sides for a way's? Did you carve alot out of the inlet end and all the way to the dam? Where did you get the soil for the dam...all the close stuff? looks like the dam may have been reasonably short because of the narrower scope of the valley...? How big is the watershed? What is your experience at the principal spillway when you get a douser?
(sorry for the multiple ?'s...this stuff gits me)

Hey wait your turn Brettski! He hasn't answered my questions yet! :p

I too remember the original thread/photo, and it looks fantastic ! Squeeky, I wish you the best my friend, but fear the worst. Holding back that ravine and all the watershed will be a challenge ! I don't sleep easy during a "cat's & dogs" rainstorm with my dam, I wonder how many others spend restless nights

Cecil proclaims "Hey kid, no cuts!"
...sorry CB1. When a pic gets posted of a candy store that big and that cool, I lose a little control.

Of course you know I was only kidding. Think we'll get answers to our questions? :rolleyes:

:D I'm laughin' with ya
That is one cool water feature. I would love to see an aerial shot. Hopefully someone can find the original thread that Squeeky posted.
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(edit: I found the thread, but I fear some pics are no longer available: Squeeky\'s thread

That old original post about says about it all, except for the size of the pond. I was overly optimistic in predictiing the eventual size. I'm still only guessing,(no actual measurements due to very irregular shaping, but mental measurements in the form of - well, that looks about like a couple of football fields in that area, another in this area, maybe a half over there, etc,etc) so, I'm guessing around 5 acres.
The larger body of water near the dam area cannot be seen in the pic. The water area upstream of the dock begins to narrow considerably.

Squeeky tries to sneak off
...not so quick. You can't just get us (me?) all hyped up and walk away without more pics. Charge dem batteries and get dat lense a'clickin'.

Brettski,

I think squeeky's a politician! He's evading the questions. He only answered one!

I'm not trying to be evasive by design. I thought that a before and after pic of a pond project might be of interest here. Particulars that might not have already been covered are :
The dam crosses a narrow location in the creek (about 70') and is ~800' in length, and extends into pasture areas on both sides. There are 30' of emergency ov areas on both common elevation end points with drain off berms. A 12' siphon pipe with valve extends thru the dam. Only once during a very heavy rain has the emergency areas been needed. Clay soils imediately in front of the dam were used in its construction. A Windows program was used to estimate volume and dam yardage. No dozer work was done upstream of the immediate dam area. The ov and pipe were lowered from the origial design due to concerns of an upstream county road. This reduced the surfaced area by about 30%. I don't have other pics to post at this time, but will take some later. I found this old pic on Photobucket that was taken during construction.

Wow...my dam looked big to me, but 800 FEET? That's E-NORMOUS!

BTW...I'm not surprised that NRCS backed out. They told me that the first area I chose would end up a 6-7 acre pond, but that the area drained about 400 acres...too much area and too many acre feet of water to get by with what they could provide. They mentioned ACoE, and that pushed me back...and that was before I found Pond Boss and realized what a nightmare that could be.

One NRCS guy was still willing to help lay it all out and work with contractors with me on the side (he's a friend, since moved away), but he also said I'd better be prepared to spend many thousands on riprap for the emergency spillway...I've seen that stream since then after a 2 hour, 5" rain. It was 6 feet deep and 50 feet wide...I would've lost a dam, probably...or it would've filled really quick.

If I win the lotter, though, that lake will get built, even if I've gotta buy some ground around me so's I don't flood back onto neighbors...

Yeah, I know Robinson. I've got 2 (much smaller) ponds built since, and should probably be thankful that I never built that big one. It's a dream site, but just has too much drainage in the event of a major storm event.

We actually had two 5" rain events one week apart about 6 years ago. I'm 42 and lived here the whole time and I've NEVER seen flashflooding like that.

DOT used a snowplow to push a bunch of railroad ties (maybe 500) back off US 61 that the storm floated across the highway...and then had to do the same thing the next weekend. At least the second time they pushed them to the DOWNSTREAM side of the road.

That's a once in a century type of thing around here, but time goes on.

...further evidence that "on the job training" can be effective.