Water moving into your dug holes could be water from the pond and/or from just 'regular' ground water moving toward the pond. ONLY time during dry summer weather will provide a good answer to your water movement concerns.
I get nervous and doubtful when some one says about the dam or the walls of a dug pond - ""They never used a packer, just the dozer and hihoe. From an untrained point of view it certainly looks to be solid.""
Looking solid is a whole lot different that being solid and the lifts being compacted together enough to hold water well throughout the basin. Water can even seep between loosely compacted lifts especially if sandy, porous soils were in the lifts. Loose soils leak, even packed soils will leak some. The degree of leakage depends on a lot of things. Soil science is complex that is why there are specialists in the field. Water moves due to a force - pressure or gravity. As I see it, small leaks provide a pathway for moving water. Moving water has energy and that moving water energy tends to incease the size of the leak over time unless something fills the void and slows the leak. Sometimes one gets lucky and a small seepage/s gets filled with clay particles and seals; most often not, due to the moving water, loose soil feature. IMO there is not a lot that can be easily and cheaply done once a pond is leaking esp a larger pond. One has to live with the leaks. It is hard to 'divorce a pond'.
Last edited by Bill Cody; 04/28/11 10:07 AM.
