Pond Boss Forums POND CONSTRUCTION Building a dam diversion ditch

Spacing probably depends on how fast the water soaks into the ground. Here, even with sandy soil, the water soaks into the ground right away. If it doesn't, that means that the ground is saturated and it will run over the top of the ground for a ways, so 100' spacing would be more than close enough.

Yes on the clay in the swale. Once you got the water to the swale you'e want to keep every last drop in it as much as you can.

I think that by having some grass growing in the swale and by having a sediment pond before it hits the main pond you would precipitate out most of the sediment. Sediment shouldn't be a problem at all if the watershed has vegetation on it.