Hey, ya'll....I'm the new guy on the block and looking forward to perusing the nearly infinite collection of helpful input. I am in the first stages of constructing a 5 acre pond in the midwest. It is located in the midst of fairly heavy hard-woods; the timber is probably avg 30 years old with some 50-60's occassionally. I am very comfortable with my excavator; is well known in the community, done many ponds in the area, and spent 8 years in the local NRCS office 15 years ago. His work quality and attention to detail are already evident. When I hired him, it was early summer and the trees and bushes made it impossible to really see what was ahead (except for USGS aerials and topo's), so a firm project quote was not possible. He is billing me $100 hour per pc equipment; using dozer and a track hoe (and earth mover to clean up scrappy waste at end of clearing process). We are just at the end of the clearing process and based on my estimations, I figger we are in the $14-15K range. This includes burning all the waste and burying the root balls. I know that there was no screwing off and trust him. I spent a couple of days just hanging around; it just seems to be so darn time-consuming, one tree at a time. Anyway, I need feed-back to the cost per acre to clear fairly thick timber (in dry conditions) based on today's (2005) costs to run heavy equipment.
