After four years of reading this website and the magazine, dreaming and getting side-tracked, this is the year that we decided to start the pond:
Our home sits on six and a half acres of mountain ground. There is only one topographical possibility for the pond but the soils are marginal. The pond will be small, somewhere around 80' x 80' best case. Soils are clay and loam. The first two feet of the entire basin are surface boulders. Little to no topsoil. Everyone who sees it calls it ambitious....is that kind of like calling someone eccentric who is actually crazy?
The trees have all been cleared minus a couple that the excavator is going to push over. We are currently waiting for rain (been a very dry summer) to moisten the soil for compaction. There is clay in the soil, just not sure if there is going to be enough for the length of core we need. We are going to build it hoping that it will hold water but prepared for the event that we have to use a membrane liner.
The excavator has built over 100 ponds in his lifetime and we were able to go see four or five in the immediate area. I trust him and just hope we can convey to him exactly what we are trying to accomplish.
The area drains water from several springs that ran this year through the first or second week of June. My best guess is about five gpm.
Goals for the pond are to add another dimension of habitat to the property. We enjoy walking around, watching nature, etc. I am thinking about FH, YP, SB, and maybe trout once we see how the pond acts. We would feed as needed.
Drain option is going to be siphon with an emergency spillway that takes advantage of the lay of the land to send water over a rock spillway into an existing rocky area. I am considering using a four inch siphon since the area does not drain a tremendous amount of water and I can get all the parts easily.
Aeration will probably have to wait until next year. Victoria wants a fountain and I see the benefit of air stones. We can probably compromise by putting in a fountain on a timer and running the subsurface aeration all the time. We'll see.
Until it rains we have been stealing rock boulders from the area and building walls all over the place. My body is not as young as it used to be. Of course, logging the area was no picnic. Lots of bruises, scrapes, falls, and bleeding. I guess it beats hanging out in bars or staring at the TV.
I will make every effort to update this thread Brettski-style as time permits. Thanks for all the help and encouragement received so far. Keep your fingers crossed....
Have you done a bucket test of dug any test hole to check for clay and how well the mix will seal?
If you have doubts about your soil, perhaps compaction and a liner would be the wiser way to go. Liners aren't cheap, but they are cheaper the first time you build than the cost of a second try.
Bucket test was successful. When I drop a ball of the soil from five feet it stays together. When you rub a ball of soil between your hands it stays together long enough to turn into a playdough like tube. My fear is the rocks we have through the soil. They become less frequent the deeper you go, but there are still plenty. The excavator / builder has worked on the neighbor's property and he is pretty optimistic.
His thought process was to wait until he was in there rooting around and he would have a better feel how things were shaping up. If he feels that there is little chance of it holding water, we would build and prepare site for liner. If he thinks we have a shot we may try to go without. What kind of a dollar difference do you think we are looking at if we don't build for the liner the first time? I figured we are saving the cost of the liner by gambling. If it doesn't hold water we lose some machine time spent making a core, moving material, etc.
I should also say that if it does look to hold water we are going to stockpile as many rocks as we can and re-use them on the site.
I don't know what the liner would cost, but I had my 1.5 acre pond built improperly for $5000 and the repair has been 20,000 and counting.
The difference comes from re-digging virtually everything, drying mixing in new soils and then laying a compacted clay liner over the entire pool area....almost 4 times the hours to re-do than it would be to do it right the first time.
It sounds like you have good clay and unless the rock is huge, sealing with clay should not be an issue. Just be sure not to leave any exposed rock that was not put back in as part of the compaction process. Cover exposed rock with at least 18-24 inches of compacted clay in 6 inch lifts (layers).
Big Congrats, Vic and Vic. This will be an interesting dig and fun to follow. You have some unusual potential pitfalls to negotiate, so keep us up to speed with pics/vid's. Has your excavator built ponds with liners, also? - ps; did Victor finish his homework from school and get his report card?
Brettski, I am flattered you remembered what one of my 'distractions' was over the last four years. Yes, I received my Master's Degree in December with a 4.0 in Safety, Security and Emergency Management. It was a tough couple of years but I am very glad that I did it.
The excavator has done some lined ponds. Though I am glad to hear Rainman's advice that if we do six inch lifts and pull out the larger rocks that we may be OK. I have a good bit of time off coming up the next two months due to furloughs and already-scheduled paid time off. I am planning on being right there for every minute of the dig. We just need some Mother Nature cooperation. Plan A - clay. Plan B - liner. Plan C - My wife gets a meadow with a small barn and a miniature horse.
Excavator moved in Monday to find soil that was less than desirable. We knew it was going to be marginal and have already prepared ourselves for Bentonite or a synthetic liner. Of course our fingers were crossed because there is some clay around. As you will see, the clay we found is just not enough. We would trade these rocks and boulders with anyone out there for clay and topsoil - but it is what it is.
So we designed a small pond very suited for our mountain property. We want it to look like as natural as possible and our excavator worked hard to sneak the massive machine around. We did all the land clearing ourselves in one of the hottest Pennsylvania summers on record. Blood and sweat for sure. Then there was a small bonfire and we were waiting for rain to allow for compaction of soils. Our builder is 70+ years old and has done over 100 ponds. Great guy who never shut the machine off from beginning of day to end except for fifteen minutes to eat a sandwich.
Now our work begins with building lots of retaining walls to make up some elevation differences and figuring out which liner option we are going to do.
I don't know why the last two pics don't come through on the page, but the last one shows a little water in the bottom. Don't get excited though, cause it will leak out soon. Great if it doesn't, but pretty sure it will.
Your photos make your "soil" look a lot like mine. I've got an incredible number of mountainous rock mixed into clay and other mixes of soil.
My frog pond / settling pond actually looks worse than your soil. It is a small hole, about 20 x 25 foot, and 6-8 foot deep. It kept at least three feet of water throughout this summer's drought. It is back at full pool, and was at full pool into early July. There is absolutely not compaction -- I dug it out with my small backhoe and smoothed it with a landscaping rake. I've been able to build lots of structure in my pond, and I've built lots of rock walls and a fire pit with the tons of rocks I pulled out.
The last photo looks pretty promising. Was your excavator able to get coverage like throughout the pond area?
Because we get as much rain as we do from October through June, and if you've a reasonable drainage area, you will probably be OK.
Ken, the excavator was able to get coverage like that throughout the entire pond. The first day he said it would never hold. The middle of the second day he said that 'you never know'. When he was finished he said that we could always just roll the dice and see if it fills and holds. So, we are just going to focus on the perimeter landscaping and see what happens.
And yes, the bruise was sore. I included the pic because I think everyone here can appreciate how hard we work physically to make our dreams into realities. It was a real tough hot summer but very rewarding so far.
Last note - water hasn't dropped a bit since our 1/4" of rain on Thursday. But don't get excited.
It really does add a great dimension to the landscape...and fits right in like it belongs there. You're gonna have a hard time "not over-doing it" by crossing the line into the man-made look with the surrounding landscaping. It's a fine line, and much more difficult to respect for smaller, more manageable territories. Less is more.
Full Pool! We finished construction on October 13th and water ran out the overflow today. There is so much work to do around and in the pond; so much to worry about whether it will hold the water or not; but for now we are just going to enjoy the moment. I had been saying when it reached full pool I would do a cannonball, I just never imagined it would be 29 degrees.
We had tons of rock left over from the pond construction, a steep grade on one side, and piles of dirt to make go away after construction. We shook everything up and this is where we are today. Pond has thousands of fatheads and apparently some gams which found their way in somehow (no stream nearby).
During construction to show the terraces:
From the top looking down:
Last edited by Victor; 08/03/1102:44 PM. Reason: Edited to put pics in post.
But just think.... One foggy night, just as the daylight wanes, you can quietly watch as a vision of a puffy CA bean counter appears, seated in the second row, proudly wearing his new BCNCP, mowing down a bucket of popcorn while 60% of it drops into the dirt.
(kinda sends a chill up your spine, don't it? I mean, really....who drops THAT much popcorn?)
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