I started posting here a while back about our small pond and started getting some good information but work and other things got in the way and I had to put it all aside. My attention has turned to the pond once again and I've come to the conclusion that job one has to be removing as much muck and silt as possible. Since there is no life beyond frogs and turtles in the pond currently I have no worries about releasing toxic gases into the water. My goal is to accomplish the following:

  • Thoroughly clean the bottom and sides down to a plain soil/rock bottom.
  • Line tributary/runoff channels with geotextile fabric overlaid by 3-5" rock.
  • Line "soft" shore areas with geotextile fabric overlaid by 3-5" rock.
  • Run PEX air line into pond and begin aeration.


Here is a diagram of the as-built conditions of my pond. Essentially it was simply dug out of the edge of a swamp with the spoils piled around the south and east sides to form a dam. As far as I can tell it is mostly filled with groundwater as it was basically just dug below the water table. In three years I've never seen the water level drop more than 3" from the top of the standpipe even in the driest spells. There are two runoff channels/tributaries that run into it that probably contribute most of the silt, so I want to try to trap that further upstream and line the channels with rock so that as the water flows down the silt gets scoured out of it. We have an old farm property so there are old stonerows everywhere from which we can "mine" all the rock we need from. In any event, I know that oftentimes a concern of removing muck is getting water back into the pond, but I don't think that will be a concern for me. Rather, I think it would be a challenge to fully drain it:

[Linked Image from i.imgur.com]

My dredging plan involves building a modified "gold dredge" in that instead of my discharge going into a sluice and back into the waterbody I'll simply discharge it to the swamp that sits below the berm:

[Linked Image from i.imgur.com]

Based on my reading I think that this Harbor Freight 2" semi-trash pump should do fine for my purposes since I really don't have much head:

https://www.harborfreight.com/2-in-212cc-Gasoline-Engine-Semi-Trash-Water-Pump-158-GPM-63405.html

I sourced four free 55 gallon poly drums from a local carwash and will be building a platform on top of them so that I can float the pump out into the pond, keeping my lines shorter and thus cheaper. I'd be grateful to hear from anyone else who has undertaken such a project about tips, pitfalls, etc... Based on measuring that I've done from my canoe I have about 6-7' from the surface to the beginning of the muck layer. From there its not clear how thick it is and what underlays it. I would love to be able to increase the depth to 8-10' feet in the middle but I'm not sure if that's realistic given what I have to work with. I'd love to just rent a trackhoe and begin scooping out a yard or more at a time, but the pond is way back in the woods and just getting the machine back there would be a challenge. Also, I will probably spend far less on my dredge rig that I can use indefinitely than I would renting a good sized machine for few days with delivery, etc...