Pond Boss Forums POND CONSTRUCTION Selecting a site Pond and House Builders

Hello all,

After a relatively long absence from pondboss, I have returned and am back to my lurking ways. With the birth of our son last week, we are starting to step up our search for a house. We are looking at getting a house or getting some property and building a house on it. I wanted to see how the overall experience of building a house and pond on the same property went for some of you guys. Its a pretty steep adventure and with 2 kids and a wife I want to be sure to get as much insider information as I can on this. In the city we live in there are a few places with Creeks and watershed for sale. One has a 8.2 acre pond on it,but I'm not sure how it would be to rehab that pond as I assume like the rest of ponds here it is silted up and probably quite shallow. Any info or experiences would be much appreciated.

Thanks all,

RB

Been there and done it. The pond was built first and extra soil was used to build house pad next to water. Bski has done the same you might look at his pond thread, he has documented the entire project from start(same place you are at now asking buy or build questions)to finish. I would not write off an existing proven pond if the price is right it may be worth checking for silting issues. Building a 8.2 acre pond can be expensive depending on the topo of the site etc. Good luck
Rocky

Thanks rocky. The wetlands that has the 8.2 acre pond is going for 128k and is said to have a 2.5 acre clearing for a house pad. I emailed a realtor to double check whether or not there are utils there already. I might check it out sunday with my float tube and see what I can yank out of there as most of the ponds in the woods that I've fished have stunted bass, perch, and BGs

Wow! I wish land was that cheap around here...

Hello everyone the wife and I went to the site but couldnt get to the pond due to having the baby with us. Its cleared for the house to be built, but then I took a look at the birds eye view and it looks like this place get SUPER choked with weeds in the summer. I just wanted to know if you guys thought this was curable and what route would you suggest going about clearing it. I fish a pond very similar to this so I believe its safe to say that this pond has a large stunted lmb population with a few bluegill running around but not in large numbers.

If you go to http://maps.live.com enter N 47.48522 W 122.74831
in the search box and you'll be able to see the pond. I just contacted the realty agency to get more info on it becuase it appeared that the land on the opposite side was for sale because the sign was over there so hopefully it was a mistake on their end and not their failure to remove the signs and the ads from the internet.

Thanks again for dealing with my newbness

RB

;ps this is the property with the said 8.2 acre pond and 23 acres of property

A couple of observations RB feel free to discard them as useless dribble:

First and foremost (IMHO) would be to find out what is involved in building a pond in your area. I'm thinking not only of cost but of any and all agency regulations. For example in California you have to jump through many hoops in order to "divert surface water" for personal use. What regulations are involved in diverting surface water in your area, what regulations are involved in building a dam, are there regulations governing wet lands, etc, etc.

I would recommend that you determine a rough estimate of building a pond in your area but from a practical standpoint I am not sure how you would go about this. The cost of building a pond will change exponentially depending upon terrain, soil type, access to property, requirement to move (or remove from the property) the dug out soil, the size of the dam. One of the soil experts here can give you a much better idea of the factors that will have an effect on the building cost than I.

The one advantage of looking at a property that has an existing pond is that you do not have to go to the expense of building a pond. The primarily disadvantage IMHO of buying a property with an existing pond is that if the pond is not designed correctly you could be facing either living with a mess or spending lots of funds to fix the pond.

Most weeds can be controlled through chemical methods. My 3 acre pond became choked with Elodea in the second year of our pond ownership but we whipped it into shape ourselves by treating it with chemicals. With an 8+ acre lake however this could get into some money.

I put your coordinates into Google earth and looked at the property. Is that an airport that is adjacent to the property? If it is then I would try to determine how much noise this will generate for your property. It would be real annoying to hear aircraft all day long.

Sheesh, I posted a long, drawn out post about looking at Brettski's links, buy Bob Lusks books, blah, blah, blah, only to determine that I had said the same thing to you in a previous thread. This is like deja vu all over again.

Thanks for the reply. I oredered several books from the pondboss store and read the previously mentioned thread and will undoubtly will re-read them. I was seeing if anyone else was willing to share there person experience in one spot but its no biggie.


I don't see much issue with diverting surface water as this state gets a ton of rain but if I do eventually end up buying land and adding a pond to it but of course we all know what assuming does. The property is located near an airport but it is a small seldomly used airport that flies out prop planes so noise is quite minimal. Just hopefully no one crashes into the house. I understand what you are saying about buying land with an existing pond and the potential problems that can come from it, but I'd like to believe that this is a natural pond. There are many in the city limits like this but that is another thing I have to ask about.

But anyways thanks for the advice I will try and do a bit more leg work and see how it all works out.

It'd be interesting to know if you know the date of the satellite view of the property that you are looking at. When I look at my place, the satellite view is from Spring of 2005.

Do all the "free" satellite viewing sites use the same images??

Google earth, that site, and the http://www.weather.com all use the same image of my place.

I 2nd the thought of checking into the noise of the airport. Even some prop planes can be pretty noisy, especially between 10:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m.!

Thanks for the words. I found a nice property now I just need to figure out if I can get a test dig done prior to throwing down an offer on it.

Choked with weeds can be fixed and 8.2 acres could be expensive to replicate elsewhere at the price.

That said, I wonder at the depth of the pond if it is choked with weeds. Go back and assure yourself that you aren't buying a shallow mess or swamp.

The lakes here get clogged with pads. I haven't been able to get boots on ground at this property. I got a hold of the realtor for this property and i was mistakened in the maps I previously posted. The coordinates are N 47.48954 W 122.75012. Its weird. In the mapper.acme the NE part of the pond is filled but in maps.live the NE part appears to be dry. I will probably check this out this week and verify.

From the sat pics this place looks like a pond that I regularly fish in the summer. The place I fish is average 6-8ft deep but can easily be 10 ft deep but its got tons of organic matter built up on the bottom. Maybe next weekend I will hike in there with my float tube and do a little investigating.

I do want to thank everyone for all the advice. I thought I found a decently good spot but after reviewing the soil it won't work. I almost went ahead and got it but asked the current land owner to do a 10' test hole and see how that goes.

Don't loose faith RB and keep looking. You'll find the right place. We had to look at and hike around a bunch of properties before we found ours and our search was nothing compared to Brettski's.

THanks JHAP. I went by the "pond" today. Its tucked pretty well in some woods. The water is pretty shallow near the shore. It starts out at about 6 inches then drops to about 3-4'. I didn't have my float tube with me so I couldn't get out any further from shore other than throwing rocks and listening to hear how it sounded. Majority of the pond is covered with a bush looking plant. I am not sure of the name but will take a camera out with me tomorrow and try to get it ID'd. Towards the middle of the pond it opens up a little bit so I assume that is the deeper waters. Looking from the shoreline there is a lot of leaves and decomposing matter on the pond floor. I wonder if I could increase the depth by raking it, but that is later on down the road. I also checked the well logs and tehre is a lot of clay deposits in this area so that is another plus for if I ever want to expand or renovate, the latter of which is a must.

I'm pretty excited but will take the pics and let the experts weigh in. Also I had a quick concern. The last two days we have had really heavy rains off and on. While driving up to the property I noticed that there was water streaming out of the woods onto the road. I am not sure if this is a man made feature (spillway) or if its just how the pond goes when it gets over filled. I am not quite sure if I should be worried about that or not especially since the shoreline that I explored is quite shallow in water depth.

Next time you are on the property follow the water trail to the pond and see where the water has be moving. Around the side is good that is the spillway. Over the top LOOK OUT.

You might want to consider purchasing a cheap inflatable boat RB. You could get a 12V air compressor to fill it up and toss in a paddle and you'd be good to explore ponds. You could put together an exploration kit, a rope with a weight to give you an idea of pond depth, a section of pvc pipe to give you an idea of pond sediment, etc, etc.

Water on the road is not great, especially if it is the only access road but that could be fixed.

Thanks jhap. I was going to get a couple yard sticks and tape them together but I like your idea much more. The water was spilling about 1/4 of mile up the road from the potential homesite. The only reason I went up that way is it was a more direct path to the pond, but I will check that out this weekend with my waders

No problemo RB. When I was looking at pond properties in 2005 BPB (the year 2005 Before Pond Boss) I had no clue what to look at in a pond. It was just sheer luck that I didn't end up with a 5 acre pond that was 4 feet deep and filled with Crappie and Koi.

This has got me to thinking (which is a dangerous circumstance, I get into all kinds of trouble when I'm scheming about something - someday you'll have to ask JWHAP about all the adventures I've dragged her through) anyway I've got a question for the members and experts and expert members:

If you were going to recommend a "pond evaluation tool kit" what would you include in it? Here's what I'm thinking: RB is in the hunt for a pond property. I suggested that he get an inflatable boat (and obviously a paddle because he doesn't want to be up poo pond without a paddle) and a weight tied to some rope to measure depth of the pond. If you were going to put together this "pond evaluation tool kit" what would you have in it and why? Remember this needs to be portable lets say a kit that could fit in the trunk of a car (that's why I suggested an inflatable boat). What are your recommendations and why?

NOTE: Pond Boss was here in 2005 but I hadn't found it, so for me 2005 was BPB.

Stopped by the pond and snapped a few pics and here they are. The average depth is probably around 5-6'. The muck is pretty thick. I didnt have a weight or rope, I just used my fishing rod and dipped it into the water. I didn't see any fish at all. Usually I can sneak up on them while in the float tube, but had no luck with my stealthiness nor did I have luck with my angling skill set. I did see a ton of cool looking birds and a lot of lil tadpoles. One of the tadpoles was brown, had a huge head, and looked to have tan stripes going across it.

I also looked at where the water was streaming into the street. It looks almost similar to a creek mouth but I have no idea why someone would put that there or whether it was the work of the beavers. Anyways without further delay here are the pictures.

This is the view from my insertion location via float tube of course.





This is the type of brush that is all over the place. Majority of it seems dead but I did see some live branches on a few.







Here are the weeds that are found in the spots where the brush is absent.







View from about 20ft into the pond from my insertion point. This is probably 30ft from the far shore. The pond extends about 20 ft short of those evergreens way in the background. You can really see how thick that brush gets and it gives you an idea of the size of the pond.




Lastly, can we say beaver alert?

Is this a natural pond or is it man made? It there obvious excavation work in the form of a dam or levy or unusual terrain changes that would have been excavated soil that was wasted outside the pond footprint?

Brettski,

I have no idea if it is man made or natural. I didn't see any piles of soil or any significant changes in the landscape that was in my eyesight and for that reason I want to say its natural, but can't be 100% sure. The agent responsible for this property is extremely difficult to get a hold of and that would be one of the questions I'd like to have him ask the property owner. I couldn't get to a lot of the shoreline to see if there was a dam or levy because of the brush being so thick. I didn't want to risk having the float tube get a hole.

It looks to me like the "weeds" (see the 12:40 photo) might be a mix of American Pond Weed and something else. Experts?

When I was evaluating properties I got in the habit of faxing or emailing a list of questions about the property to the realtor. I would usually start out by saying that I was highly interested in the property. That would usually (although not always) get a response.

It seems strange you didn't see any fish but then again with the volume of weeds in the pond they have a lot hiding places.

The location sure is beautiful.

If it is, indeed, a natural pond, you will be able to estimate it's true depth by viewing the terrain above the water level. You can expect the terrain to stay consistent to the center, but more likely it will actually lessen in slope as it moves to the deepest part of the BOW. I say this based on the pics you have provided. I see nothing indicating a ravine or sudden drop off...only a gentle curve to the bowl that contains the water. We had the same thing on our property before we actually constructed the pond. It was the center of a gentle bowl (a 5 acre bowl), but it only help water in a shallow pond about 150 feet across. When the water level reached the critical depth, it would spill out and trickle down a narrow little channel like a brook. About 700 feet away, we had a natural land formation that created 2 little hills on either side of this tiny brook. That's where we set the dam and backed up the big mamu.
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You need to find out if it's man made. Boy, it might just be the same thing we had. That could be very good, but only if you can find where the overflow is running and determine if you can stop the run-off with some kind of dam. Then, of course, you will have to survey to determine the size of the dam to capture and raise the water level.
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oh, and btw...
When we did cut into that original little natural pond, we had to cut thru about 8 feet of silty soil that had been collecting at this, the center of the surrounding bowl. Likely hundreds of years of erosion. Below it? Blue clay.

JHAP: I tried to contact this realtor about 3 weeks ago and he didn't reply to the email. I ended up calling the reality agency and got a hold of him that way. That is how I was able to make the correction to the location of the property, which I had initially thought it was a property closer to the airport. The realtor was quick and almost seemed rushed in our conversation and it ended with him telling me to go ahead and make my way to the property by myself to check it out. Its currently going for 120k for 23 acres, but has been on the market for 778 days so when I do a bit more researching I am going to offer a price lower than that because there has apparently been little to no interest on it.

About the absense of fishing during my escapade I wonder if the fish were killed in the winter time. With such a shallow depth I wonder if the water froze to the point where oxygen levels tanked. We had a really cold winter with a lot of snow and freezing, but who knows.

Brettski: The water did get deeper as I got more to the center of the pond. THere were spots with little to no vegetation but I believe the decomposing matter on the pond floor is skewing the true depth. I am glad you brought up your experience with the natural bowl. If that is the case with this pond, I know where the overflow is and the water streams out of it after a heavy rain. I had a question. If the run off is stopped up with a dam would the rest of the terrain need to be raised or would the height of the dam lead to the flooding of the shallower and dry land that is in close proximity to the pond? I assume this would ultimately increase the depth and size of the pond? I have searched the well logs of this area and from 10-30 ft there is clay and sand. The homesite which has been cleared appears to have decent clay right beneath the soil. Its not quite GA clay but it looks promising.

It all comes down to elevations and topography. Our "bowl" was well defined and taller along one side. This area that was taller and defined was closer to the heart of our parcel, so it was not going to be an issue with backing up the water. The concern was the opposing side. That other side was fairly close to the property line and the elevations were lower. We feared that when we dropped dirt into the area between the hills (dam) to back up the water, it would not go very high before it would spill over onto our neighbors' property at this lower side. We went out to the property boundaries surrounding the area where the pond would go. We used a laser level and worked thru the woods, 50 - 75 feet at a time. We started at that lower area, right at the property boundary. We called that elevation "zero". We then began to shoot elevations thru the trees, heading back to the natural pool. Whatever difference in elevation we got from the property boundary to the top of the natural pool, we subtracted 2 feet. This 2 feet would be the buffer to keep the water away from our neighbor. Since our topography at that critical area by the neighbor was very gradual, 2 feet of buffer elevation provided about 75 feet of lateral distance.
I don't remember the exact inches of difference we got, but it wasn't alot. Maybe 80" or so (104" - 24" buffer). So, this told us we could add 80" of depth to the natural pond. We guessed the natural pond to be about 18" deep.
OK, next step is to work from the natural pond to the area where the dam will be. This basically means to follow the trickle of the overflow that spilled out of the natural pond. We shot those elevations down to the small valley between the hills where the dam would go and got about 36" of elevation drop. This told us that the unexcavated, natural pool would be about 80" + 36" at the dam. Then we figured 24 - 36" of excavation in much of the pond basin to a) make the dam b) make the building pad c)make a road to follow about 1/3 of the pond.
In the end, we wound up with 13 - 14' at the dam, and 8' - 10' at the other end where the original natural pond started.
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We didn't know how big the surface would be; too much timber and didn't bother with GPS coordinates. It didn't matter in our case since we would take whatever we got in the end.
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a few details