Pond Boss Forums POND CONSTRUCTION Renovating a Pond or Lake? Lake Rehab Project

We're getting pretty close to the finish line with our dirt work. This weekend we installed 10 Ray Scott-style cedar & oak habitats at 5' - 6' depths fairly near the shoreline. We have 2 dry peninsulas and 2 submerged peninsulas where the top is 2' below water and there's 6' of depth on either side. Along the southern edges of the lake the track hoe scooped out 5 1/2' of depth up to 20' out from the shoreline and then there is a sharp drop off to anywhere from 2' to 4'. Also, the equipment operators made quick work of driving pilings for my dock. They lined up my 6x6 x 16' treated timbers and the track hoe pushed them 4' into the clay lickety split. And that is some hard, dense clay!



Submerged peninsula & habitats


Dry peninsula & habitats


View toward south end



Still have some work to do. Need to put up about 10 more habitats and probably 4 pallet pyramids. 400 tons of rip rap will be put on the levee in the next week or so. It will extend 1.5' vertical into the water on a 2:1 slope. That should give the crayfish & minnows some places to hide.

Here are some pics from Friday, October 23rd. The levee is plugged and most habitats are in place. The plan was to put down rip rap this week but now they're calling for more rain. If it ever dries out we'll install a bunch of pipes around the lake including a 60" aluminized arch pipe ($ ouch) on the far end to handle 100+ acres of watershed run off. Then they'll do the final road grading around the lake and be done. I'm almost ready to put fish in, finally!

Here's the tip of a new peninsula and a new island. Today they are putting a couple of huge sandstone rocks from my property on top of the island for kids' jumping pleasure.

From the levee here's a view of the peninsula and part of the island. To the right of the peninsula they are putting the rootball of a large red oak upside down as a fish habitat in about 5.5' of water.

The rootball. The stump side will be buried and pressed into the clay.

In this photo they are scraping a ledge into the face of the levee to handle the fabric and the rip rap.

Man! The place is looking great!

Make sure that the 2 feet out of the water peninsulas are high enough to be that high after compaction and subsidence. Been there on a large sacle only to have one compress to water level after 2 years. I would raise it a foot above where you want it to end up and insist on it being compacted. Great thought process and ideas.

Adding a little extra dirt is a good idea. Have had the same problem as Erick.

Thanks Rainman. Man, that would stink to have that happen! We talked about this recently and just today he raised the elevation of the island and the new peninsula to 3' above water level. He mashed it pretty hard with the track hoe, too. Hope it works... Thanks for the advice!

The 60" pipe was installed on the far end of the lake to handle the lion's share of the runoff from 100+ acres of watershed. God help us all if we ever have so much rain that this beast can't handle it! It's 35' feet long, steel and coated in some sort of polypropylene-like substance.

What a monster!

If you do get a heavy flow, I would suggest pouring concrete aprons on both ends to help prevent wash-out. An emergency earthen spillway would save a breech in case a log blocks that pipe also.

Roger that, Rainman.