Pond, maybe in my future????

At the place we are building, we have a nice site for a small pond. Went to the local farm office and they calulated out that we have a area of our property that drains about a 12 acres. Already a dry gulch there, which gets very wet when we get some rain. (last few years we have been in a drought) Yet there is still water in the gulch, maybe a spring there.

Anyway, while I have my loader, giving thought to digging the area out, and building a dam etc etc.. Pond would be about 1/4 acre.

My question, we have good surface water here, about 20' below via a point well. Thinking about driving a point well, and installing a wind pump to supply additional water to the pond. We are on a hill, get a breeze most mornings and evenings. Anybody have eperience with these? Anybody built one themsleves? Thought this might be a fun project.

L.

Hi Lloyd--I built one on my property about 4 years ago and will do another small one this Spring.

I went to the NRCS, they drew up an engineered "grade stabilization" plan. This pond drains 23 "Highly Erodable" Acres, is 11 feet deep at the center and covers almost 1 acre when full. This was cost shared about 75/25 and I feel it was worth it. My only responsibility is to "maintain" the waterway leading into the pond for 10 years which is what a prudent person would want to do anyway.

Other than my 8N that I used to disc in seed and mulch, and mow the grass, this is the equipment we used to build the pond. The scraper/compactor was nice to have.


Here is the pond before finish grading.


Ready for mulching and a light rain....


Last year after a heavy rainfall.


We dug down until we reached clay and moved and compacted the clay on the bottom....it took about 3 years before this pond would hold water all year round...it held about 8 feet in it all year and now attracts geese and wood ducks to it.

Make sure you put an overflow pipe system in it, with a "spillway" to handle really heavy rains or you will be rebuilding it someday---don't ask how I know this....

Good Luck---you will enjoy the end result for many years.

Tim

The physics of ponds here in Wisconsin has always baffled me. Many naturally filled hill side ponds are 15 or 20ft higher than neighbors house only 100 ft away. The ground water must really follow the surface contour.

Windmills are hard to find used on the east coast. Hauled mine back here from New Jersey last summer. Almost never calm up here. This old (obsolete 70 yrs ago, still supported by the company) windmill will feed a pond up on my mountain, springs are too weak and too far down the mountain so like you I'll go with a well. But no points here, drilling required. Given my water resource and lack of clay, I'll be installing a pond liner.

If you don't find a windmill, look into solar pumps. Mature hardwood forest here, not a good option for me.

Uncomplicated, but a lot of effort to get it all set up. I'm hoping to get enough flow to raise trout, then drop it 275' and squeeze some electricity out. As you mentioned, great project. Go for it.

Thanks, we have LOTS of clay here,,,,,should open a potery! LOL

I think the windmill will be cool, don't think I've ever seen one around here, or New Jersey!!!

L.