Pond Boss Forums POND CONSTRUCTION Selecting a site Dammed gully

That looks like a very nice place! Hopefully the leak will be, or is solved.

Thanks for the comments, Non Typical CPA. I would have responded earlier but I didn't want to bump my own thread until I had more substance to add to it. Now, I will attempt to get this thread up to date. I should have done so a couple of months ago. I was using a trial version of windows office on which to compose my posts and the trial period unexpectedly ended. I refused to pay 150 bucks for the program. Therefore, I wasn't able to retrieve my work and had to start over after suffering through a period of bereavement. Well, that, and the fact that I didn't feel like dealing with Photo*ucket. Photo*ucket is my new pet name for Photobucket. I doubt that I'm alone in this sentiment. Anyhow, here goes.

In my last post pertaining to the pond I reported that in the Spring of 2011 a heavy rain had refilled the pond with clear water. Well, during the summer of 2011 we experienced an exceptional drought and the pond dried up completely
and remained dry throughout the rest of the year. When it did refill in early 2012 it was so muddy that the banks appeared to be stained after the water once again receded. (Below) Pictures of the mud stained banks.
. .

After three years of observing and taking measurements I had come to the conclusion that the pond was leaking rapidly down to the same point, six feet below full pool. This is the same elevation as the top of the sand layer. There were a couple of spots at this elevation I suspected may not have adequate clay coverage.
During the summer of 2012 when the pond was once again bone dry, I took action to stop the leaking. I used my tractor to mine some of the white clay from the trench we had dug next to the dam during the initial construction. I drug this clay to the locations I suspected of leaking and created a patch.

After completing the repairs it donned on me, I could quickly line the entire pond with this higher quality white clay. The red clay which lined the majority of the pond had also been on my list of suspected reasons for the rapid disappearance of water. I believe this red clay is too granular, making it less impervious to water penetration. (The picture below shows the wicking ability of the granular red clay.)
I spent three 10 hour days mining white clay from the trench and dragging it along the bottom of the pond with the box blade, pulverizing it along the way. I spread the clay across the entire bottom and all along the sides of the pond, achieving about 8 inches of coverage. Afterwards, I used my pick-up and tractor to pack it down as best I could. Next, I turned my attention to the upper end of the pond where the island was located. I say the island “was” located there, because, at this moment I conceived the idea of constructing another pond, using the material contained in the island to build a dam. I never did like that danged old island and completely removing it with only my tractor was not an option. It only took me one 10 hour day to scrape down one side of the island and use the material to plug the narrowest channel. However, after two more 10 hour days I found myself only two thirds of the way finished filling the wider channel on the other side, when it began to rain. (Below) My latest, and hopefully my last, revised plan.

Fortunately, it only rained a ½ inch, but that was enough to shut me down for a couple of days. During these two days I used 1-inch PVC pipe to siphon water from the two large puddles that had accumulated. (Above) Siphoning water with 1 inch pvc pipe. At the time the photo was taken I hadn't yet scraped and recoated the dam, which you can see in the background. (Below) Notice the contrast of color in the background of the red clay vs. the white clay. When I resumed work I had to first scrape out the muck from the bottom of both ponds in order to speed the drying process, for I found myself racing the clock again due to the impending rain that was forecast. . .

After a couple of days of drying time, I resumed work and placed a 10 inch PVC overflow pipe across the dam and quickly covered it. Due to more impending rain in the forecast and the realization that I didn’t have time to mine enough material to finish stacking the new dam to a finished height, I purposely installed the overflow 2 foot lower than I would have liked. After this adventure a backhoe attachment for my tractor is definitely on my wish list. Scraping hard clay with a box blade and front end bucket is literally a pain in the tractor seat.

After installing the pipe I used a previously staged stock pile of white clay to quickly finish lining the large pond side of the new dam, and do some touch-up. As soon as I completed the renovation of the larger pond it began to rain.
(Above) The new dam is almost complete. The white pvc overflow pipe is visible in the left side of photo. (Below) View from the larger dam overlooking the relined pond and the new, smaller pond's dam.
And rain it did. A literal gully washer. It rained two inches in about 30 minutes and I watched in horror as the small pond received the runoff from the meadow. The water rose quickly and soon engulfed the 10 inch overflow pipe, ultimately achieving a height 1 foot above the top of the pipe, inches shy of breeching the unfinished dam before receding . The rain had filled the small pond completely and the larger pond filled up to about a 3 foot depth.

After a few days of drying time I resumed construction and dug an overflow spillway for the new pond. While doing so I used the dirt I removed from the spillway trench to complete the dam. For the next few weeks measurements showed the small pond receding about 1/8 inch per day, and the larger pond dropping about 1/4 inch per day. So far, so good.

In early January 2013, a slow moving system moved across much of the U.S. from west to east, filling many of our thirsty ponds along the way. This turned out to be the perfect rain for refilling the newly renovated pond, for it was a slow soaking rain and it refilled the small pond completely and the larger pond to within 20 inches of full pool. A heavy rain would have created excess runoff which might have eroded the newly placed clay. (Above) At the time of photo the water level in the large pond is about 2 foot below full pool.
. (Below) In the future I might install a 10 inch PVC 90 degree elbow on the overflow pipe in order to gain some more depth. For now, the small pond is about 6 foot deep. .
(Below) The blue line shows the emergency spillway for the small pond. It dumps into the larger pond. I still need to pour a concrete apron at the edge of larger pond, where the spillway dumps, to prevent erosion.

While I was stuck in the house during this rainy weather I discovered the Pond Boss Forum and began reading about the experiences of others. These stories inspired me to post this thread, documenting my own pond building experience.

Since then, we haven't received any significant rain, and measurements have shown the larger pond to be receding at a rate of 1/4 inch or less per day, and the smaller pond receding at a rate of 1/8 inch or less per day. I am very pleased with the results and now look forward to addressing other areas of pond management, in hopes of ultimately achieving an attractive and trouble free aquatic utopia.

I guess the biggest lesson I learned from this pond building experience is. Be sure and use the right kind of clay when building a pond. I got lucky by way of having some good clay available with which I was able to re-line the pond. If this clay had not been available this project could have been a costly disaster. As of now I've spent about $4,500 building the pond. A far cry from the original $100 I spent building the first pond. But not that bad, considering what it could have cost. Like I said, I got lucky.

Your ponds look great; $4,500 not too much to spend for the results!

Thanks, dj. Yeah, I guess $4500 would be a good deal. Unfortunately, I forgot to include the $1000 it cost to build the concrete spillway. I keep trying to forget about that spillway, whereas I'm unhappy with the looks of it. In the future I might complete the runaround spillway I had originally envisioned, and bury the eyesore. That'll probably cost me another couple of thousand.