Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations About to give up... help

I live on 2.4 acres and have a pond in the front yard that is probably about 1/8 to 1/4 an acre. It serves 2 purposes: Decorative and Fishing. It is about 10 ft deep at the deepest part... probably averages 4-6 ft deep. Fish population is in good shape and I have the water looking nice and dark and fairly clear... it is algae free. My #1 problem with the pond is keeping the water level up. Other problems/frustrations include: keeping it weed free on the shore (it has very steep banks), free of floating plants (with yellow flowers). But if I could just solve the water level problem, that would all but take care of the other two... because if I could keep it full, then I would not have 3 feet of steep bank to weedeat (ouch my back) and I could easily keep the floating weeds at bay with a rake since the pond is small. It's down about 3 feet right now. Sometimes I am so desperate for water (and the fish too) that I run the garden hose in it for hours at a time (overnight). This helps boost the level an inch or three, but doesn't make me happy with the water bill! I only do this when we have long stretches of no rain (like now!). The pond gets very little runoff and it takes a lot of rain to fill it back up... it is not creek or spring fed. Again it's for decorative and fishing purposes... each equally important. The Decorative aspect is very important because it is in my front yard! Let's just say right now it is NOT adding to my home's "curb appeal". So I am thinking about just draining and filling it in, because I am tired of the fight each summer to keep water in it and to keep it trimmed and looking nice, not to mention the cost of the chemicals to keep the water looking good + my water bill. Any ideas to give me hope of keeping it full of water? Is it possible to dig a well? If so, who does that type of work and where would they dig it... in the pond itself? Anyway, I am pretty discouraged about it, but I've got to do comething. What would you do if you were in my shoes? Thanks for your help!

Are you in an area where you can drive your own well? I drove a 2" well and invested in a sprikler pump. This may be overkill for a smaller pond, but a sand point well is inexpensive and easy to put in. In my part of the country we don't need a permit, which was nice. The well and pump could also be used to water your lawn and cut down on your water bill. When I put my first one in (I have put in a few) I used a sledge hammer which is hard on your back as well as the pipe. I have a friend who is in the rental business and he told me to use a demolition hammer (jack hammer) and they had a special bit that slipped over the end of the pipe. You use a sacrificial nipple because it gets chewed up, but it puts it down quick. Also, make sure that you have something to steady the pipe. Each section is 5ft so you will need a way to get on top of the pipe, yet hold it firm. I found that the bed of a pickup truck worked great. I used a rachet strap to secure the pipe while I stood in the bed of the pickup. Just lift the hammer on top of the pipe and let it do the work. I drove 23 feet in a matter of minutes! Good luck!

Waterloo, Sorry to ask what are probably silly questions, but your post is very interesting. How do you know when you have hit water?
How do you remove the "nipple" or whatever covers the end going thru the soil? The more details the better. Thanks, Randy

rmedgar,

Don't appologize. Your question is a good one. However, I am not a well expert, so I can only speak from my experience. For my situation I knew that water wasn't too far down because my house has a shallow well and when I dug my pond I hit water at 16ft. I used a garden hose and stuck it down the pipe (similar to an oil dip stick)to determine when I hit water. As for the nipple, the pipe sections are threaded on each end. The drive point has female threads which you thread your first section into. Normally, people will use what is called a "drive cap". It is a heavy duty cap that threads onto the pipe to protect the threads while you drive it. However, what I did is connect the "drive coupler" which connects each section the the previous section, then I add a short section of pipe (maybe 6"). This is my sacrificial nipple. The jack hammer bit slips down into the pipe and has a waited collar which causes the nipple to "mushroom" a bit. You drive the pipe down 5ft at a time, then unscrew the sacrificial nipple, thread on a new 5ft section onto the coupler and repeat the process. When I hit water I made sure it filled the bottom few feet of the pipe. Once I was down far enough I took my hose and flushed out the pipe by running it up and down to force out the muddy, sandy water. As I understand it most of these "shallow well" pumps are designed to pump from 25ft or less. You could probably talk to your local health department about where your water table would be at your place. I hope this helps.

When I was a kid and we built our Summer place in Eagle River WI, we drove a sand point for our own drinking water well. In our case, the property was populated with mature pines. We selected an area where 2 stout trees flanked both sides, ran a 2 x 10 between the trees about 15' up, and hung a pulley directly over the drill zone. The driving unit was a solid 1" round bar, about 5 feet long, with a 10# or 12# weight welded to the top (some compact metal mass) and the this mass had a metal loop or eye welded to the top of it. A rope was attached to this loop/eye, up thru the pulley, and down to manual pull/drop cycles. We used the same sacrificial drive coupler and technique as Waterloo has described.

That is the way all wells were dug before the rotary rig was developed. A sharpened steel bit was welded to a length of pipe. The pipe was lifted and dropped repeatedly into the hole where water had been poured. The water was to become a slurry of pounded rock when it became sand. It was periodically bailed out and then replenished with fresh water. When more water was bailed than had been poured, the amount of run in or "seep" was calculated. These early machines were called spudders. Even today, when a new well is started it is called "spudding in".

Have you thought about running a drain from your house gutters into the pond. Might not be the cure all, but with every rain you could perhaps double the amount of water into your pond. Depending on the amount of roof space you have.

sciotoguy-After being told that it wouldn't work, I did this for the swimming pool at our last house. When we sold the house 6yrs later it was still working fine but the new owner hired a pool company who imediately ripped it out. Since then he has been crying about the high cost of city water.(We used to fire up the heater as soon as I could melt the ice using a bubbler and swam from April til November in southern Ontario)