Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations A few dredging questions

Hello, all. My first time here, although I've been lurking and seen some good stuff.

I need to have my 1/2 acre pond repaired. It is 30 yrs old without maintenance, getting pretty silted in, and the water level is down 2 feet because the top of the outlet pipe has corroded away. I don't know for sure how deep the silt is, but I'm estimating 2-4 feet on average all the way round. I anticipate we will need to cut the dam, and then I am looking closely at that syphon system described in another thread.

I had two excavators out here recently. One indicated that he could do it this winter - let the water out, and then a week or two later come back and dredge out the silt in a couple of days of work. He said that the cold weather, freezing the muck, would help the effort. We're in Northern Virginia here, and winter temperatures hover between 20-40 degrees daytime.

The other fellow described a more traditional path which I've heard elsewhere. He suggested cutting the dam in the spring, letting it dry out all summer, and then dredging. He said the dredging would be nearly a months work for his operation (1 dredge operator and 1 truck).

Are these scenarios realistic? Can dredging be done in the winter? Is a 1 month estimate for a 1/2 acre pond for real? Do we have a smiley for skepticism?

Thanks in advance!

Welcome DaRube this site can be very educational, and I'm sure everyone welcomes some new opionions to the mix.
The post that has been circulating most recently about dredging was for dredging using a suction derdge. They only work in ponds with water. I've heard people refer to any process of muck removal as dredging but it seems the two you've spoken to are not talking suction dredge work. Considering how soft and sticky the mud can be, I'd be skeptical of taking a piece of heavy equipment in there when it's in the semi frozen muck state. Muck by any other name is still muck, and a tractor or dozer buried in the mud can be a difficult chore to remove. On the up side it would make nice habitat! I'd vote for drying it out and doing as the second guy proposed.

I did the same thing you are talking about doing to one of my ponds a few years ago. My pond was just about the same size as yours. The contractor cut the dam, pumped out the rest of the standing water. The silt will obviously retain lots of water.

The contractor was able to get a low enough slope into the pond that he was able to drive the tractor to the muck grab a bucket load and back out. I was also lucky from a cost perspective because I was able to use the muck to fill in some low areas on my property.

The whole operation took him about two weeks including some reshaping of the banks. One word of advice, make sure your contractor has up to date insurance.

The specifics of your situation might dictate one approach over the other. I was able to have the work done during our dry times. If we had gotten any rain it would have slowed things down considerably.

Good Luck

JW

Thanks, guys, for the info and the welcome.

The suction I was referring to was the drainage / overflow system from Pond Dam Piping which was in a thread in the "Building A Dam" section. It is an intriguing concepts, and I'd love to see one in action.

But "Suction Dredging" does bring up an interesting idea. Yes, there are areas of my pond bed that are now exposed or too shallow, and would not qualify for this approach. But I wonder if I could save time or money by a combined approach - having the deep areas suction-dredged back to their original depth prior to bursting the dam - and then having the shallows dredged in the traditional manner. Of course, a half acre isn't huge, so it may not pay the cost of even getting someone down here to do it. Any thoughts?

DaRube,

I to read with interest the suction overflow system and would like to see it in action.

As far as suction dredging I have never looked into it. If you investigate and find a contractor and get cost info I would be interested.

Like you said 1/2 acre is not very large and my guess is that the cost to suction dredge would be prohibitive.

If you did not want to cut the dam you could even rent a gas powered pump and get most of the water out that way.

Good luck whatever you decide and my appologies for not being more help at this point.

JW