Welcome to the forums LarryBud! (from a fellow Missourian)

You did not say how you determined the actual water depths, so I should say that it's best done empirically. My property with a pond had a 1/4 acre pond on it when I purchased it that appeared to be 8 to 10 feet deep by looking at the size of the dam and the surrounding land, but it had silted in to be only 2 foot deep (very old cattle pond - circa 1950's???). I actually put a row boat in and could measure the depth with the oar all the way across. Dredging that would have been far more expensive than what I ended up doing.

I had the dam broke initially with a mini excavator that allowed it to drain all 2 foot of water, gave it the summer to dry out some, and then had a medium sized track loader come in and cut the dam wider and deeper so that it could drive through it and remove the 8 foot of muck. They packed the dam break after the muck removal with the clay and rock that was cut out and we waited several months for it to fill back up. This pond had no leak problems, so your situation is a bit different. The leak the second thing I would try to figure out (besides true water depth if not 100% sure).

The current depth of your pond is suitable for fish currently. You could do nothing but stock it and see what happens. It's curios why it has no fish however...Muskrats maybe? They are a strong candidate for the pond leaking too.

Have you owned it long enough to know if it gets a lot of algae growth in the summer?...The scummy floating kind (know as FA here on the forums - Filamentous Algae). An abundance of FA is usually a sign of an abundance of shallow waters and nutrients.

If you decide to tear into the dam, you should consider putting in some kind of overflow so that it can drain without going over the top. An appropriate sized through-the-dam pipe is the base model while a siphon drain systems would be top of the line.

The fact that the leak seems to be a more recent occurrence...I'd get that straightened out before investing much love and money into the rest.


Fish on!,
Noel