Not sure this is the right place for this, but here goes.

I bought my place two years ago. It has a 1.7 acre spring-fed pond with a steady flow through. When I bought it, it has a stand-pipe overflow drain and an old culvert spillway that had broken and was deteriorated. The springs flow so much that water constantly comes out of the stand-pipe and also ran in the culvert. The water had begun to run around the end of the culvert and cause the dam to erode.

So the first thing I did was hire a local contrator to repair the dam. This was before I subscribed to Pond Boss and before I had found this forum, so I just did what he told me. What he recommended and installed was a second PVC spillway that pulled water off the surface of the pond and dumped it in the creek behind the dam.

Here is a picture.



The two arrows point to the stand-pipe and the new PVC pipe.

Here is another picture showing the intake. (and the homemade trash guard).



Both pipes flow constantly. The PVC pipe fills up a 5 gallon bucket in 1-2 seconds and the flow from the stand-pipe is similiar.

After I subscribed to Pond Boss and found this forum I became more edumacated and in additon to all the other challenges my pond presents, I now see its not a good idea to draw water off the top. See my posts atfor my other issues:
http://www.pondboss.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=103339#Post103339

So my questions are:

1. Is this a big enough issue to go to the trouble and expense of fixing?

2. If yes, then what would you prose?

3. Since both pipes handle normal water flow, do I still need an emergency spillway?

Thanks.

Last edited by BillB; 02/15/08 03:23 PM. Reason: %$###