In the past 30 years, everything under the sun, in the books and from the coffee shop has been tried. Most of the time with good success. The plastic liner is great----Only ripped one of them during construction.
The clay liner with material from on the property, has been good when the clay was good, and installed properly. The better the clay the better the pond held water.
Bentonite is also great ---there are different grads of this product some swell 18 times their size when hydrated some only swell 4 times their dry size. BUT never has the results been good without proper installation.
Any new product that comes up has been tried, and always looking for Anything new.
Fed livestock in the bottom have had some good results and some not so good results. Some ponds that looked good did not do well but after a few rains they held well. One of the worse ponds that was ever built has ended up being full most of the time.
Do not give up every situation is different continue to keep everyone posted so we can all learn.
