Hey All, I just stumbled upon your forum and trying to soak in as much as I can.
I've got 1/3 to 1/2 half acre pond that doesn't stay full in the summer. Long and short, I hired a contractor to rebuild it to 1-1.5 acres. It's a deep valley behind the dam and what appears to be a 1-2 acres of tree clearing. 10k yards are estimated for the new dam. We are figuring 20-25 feet deep.
1 month of work including stacking trees I am keeping, finish grading and an overflow drain. What are your thoughts on cost?
Thanks. I'll get some pictures up of what it looks like today.
I’m in Springboro area and have chased water for a year since build, first fill up, then changes above me (neighbor built house and cut water flow to me). I feel your water pain and have gone from trying well water (not enough gpm) to ditch water solution. I, too, have a field ditch I’ve tapped for help. At first I was transfer pumping from a collection tub. Wow, what a pain. I lived with that pump like we were married and tracked every inch, charted it, and measured on a stick just like you have ! My family was pretty sick of me celebrating each inch milestone. I did some research over the winter and this spring I built a check dam in the ditch with pipe to the pond. The pipe takes the collected pool of water behind the dam and sends to pond. I was worried about the elevation, but am getting about 7-9” of vertical drop over a 90’ length. It works perfectly. I have a screen on the dam side of the pipe and a cap for high water or ‘pond full’ conditions. I’m about 10 months in to this solution and have learned a lot. I’ve adjusted the check dam design a few times and am really happy with it now. (Had a 4” in 2 hour water event in June so I’ve seen the high water mark…or probably a 20 year flood condition anyway) I’ve learned about the ditch too. By pooling the water and eventually capturing almost 100% of it, you get extended water capture after any rain….except…when crops are in the field area and high weeds are in the lead-in ditches. Yes, to answer your question, the surface runoff is dramatically affected by vegetation cycles (not an expert, I just feel the effect). Sorry so long. Your problem really resonated with me. I too had a small leak to solve before the water source problem. I am beyond proud of the beautiful ecosystem I’ve created and joy we get from it. I know your project didn’t hit this wedding timeline, but you are well on your way to many other memories made! Good luck !
Well... we got 1" inch of rain and some snow 10 days ago. No real ground saturation yet and watching the forecast like a hawk.
I did get my bridge finished up. I used 3 telephone poles for beams and rough-sawn 1x6 oak for the decking. I'm debating the install of the pavilion on the dock or hold off a save the funds until we see if it holds water.
It's been a month since Contractor #2 has left the premises. He determined that the pond was leaking through a layer of old pond junk material that was under the new dam and never removed. We put in a new much larger and deeper core trench in front of the dam, repacked and feathered in. 300 series machines and rock trucks make for quick work.
We raised the bottom of the "problem area, 15k square feet" by 2ft and I applied 4x the recommended dosage of soil floc polymer on top covering about 20k square feet. No sooner did the deep end get completed and we had a rain event that created a pool. They got finished and we had about 1.5" drop from hurricane Ida. Just ten miles south of me got 6 inches of rain.
After a month, we are holding the same amount of water except for a little loss from evaporation.
If ya'll don't mind, send some water my way to SE Ohio.
Daily loss [including evaporation] = .31" Excluding evaporation you could be .15-.2" daily loss due to seepage.
[In the pond rehab business we don't consider anything under .33" a reason to address in areas receiving at least 20" annual precipitation.]
Prior to rehab you were losing over 2" daily IIRC.
Your efforts reduced leak rate by 85-90%
Your reduction in water loss is reason for congratulations!
Per our multiple discussions your watershed and annual rainfall isn't sufficient to keep your pond full without assistance of supplemental irrigation. This serves as the impetus for your continued angst I guess. Obviously unless one of these factors is addressed [pond size reduction, increase watershed, supplemental irrigation] even a pond sealed like tupperware won't remain full due to atmospheric influence if precipitation cannot replace the loss. Pond was not designed appropriately.
