Those bobcats bounce you around pretty good, don't they? You are in the lake effect area, so you'll have a pretty good covering of snow on the pond during the winter. Shallow ponds tend to winterkill easily without winter aeration. For your area, if it was my pond, I'd like to have at least 40% of the surface area at 12' water depth, figuring down from the average water table depth in the soil. You'll get some sediment washing in, either from rain or groundwater carrying soil into the pond until it fills up. My wag is to plan on 1'-2' of stuff carried into the deepest part of your pond. If you want to see what my mess looked like, look
here .
We dug down to 22', and had almost 4' of soil wash back into the pond right after it was completed (12" of rain from one storm did the dirty deed).
That's a good deal on the rental.
