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A Pond Renovation Experience: Walden
Pond
 This summarizes a do-it-yourself (DYI) pond renovation project that
was started in late August of 2004. Topics included are 1) background 2)
construction approach, 3) equipment utilization and 4) lessons learned and
costs. Before examining these topics, a brief description of the old pond and
the overall project is provided as background.
1. Background
The pond to be renovated was located
at the extreme end of my property in East Texas. Except for cattle and
wildlife, this pond had few visitors during its estimated lifetime of about 70
years. The size of the pond had shrunk over the years from an area in excess of
¼ acre and 12 feet depth to less than half of its original size and a
depth of about 4 feet.
 The changes in size and depth were the result of years of erosion
and sediment build-up and wildlife (probably Beaver or Nutria) penetration of
the dam. Despite the problems associated with this pond, it was a prolific
producer of native LMB and even in a completely unmanaged state was home to
thriving populations of small forage fish and had reportedly produced LMB of
about 7 pounds
2. Construction Approach
I had two
purposes in mind for this pond:
 1) to renovate an existing old pond and 2) to expand the pond from
¼ acre to 2 acres. The renovation proved to be the most difficult task,
so let's talk about it first. The old pond was covered up in brush and trees,
mostly pines. Removing the brush was easy, the pine trees proved more
difficult, but eventually they also were removed. Pine trees have an incredible
root system. Even trees 20 feet away from the old dam had their root tentacles
into the dam. As a result, the old dam was virtually worthless. In addition,
animals had undermined the dam to the point where it wouldn't hold water.
Unfortunately, I didn't discover this until after the finished pond refilled.
This caused significant re-work, to the point where I would have been better
off to have completely leveled the old dam and started over. The tunneling
systems established by animals had to be seen to be believed. The tree roots
also caused significant damage. Together, they had completely ruined the old
dam. One of the problems with an old pond is what to do with all the "muck"
that has built up over the years. After struggling with this problem for some
time, I decided to turn the liability, muck, into an asset, an underwater
island. To do this, I simply pushed the muck into a circle with sufficient clay
around the edges to hold it in place. That island of muck will be 4 feet under
water and 4 feet above the surrounding water. I believe it will make superb
"structure". It took probably less than 3 hours with the dozer to build this
island…other solutions were far more expensive and time consuming. Now to
the new construction. This was accomplished by the standard approach of coring
out the base for the dam and pushing clay and packing clay on the dam. Time
consuming, but not difficult. Some problems were encountered with cutting clay
in the hard dry summer, but a rake was used to attach to the dozer blade for
help in this regard. I also made use of a portion of the old side dam to make a
nice island with one surviving pine tree.
3.0 Equipment
This entire project was accomplished with a Case 450c dozer and a
Kubota backhoe/front-end loader. The loader was especially useful in moving
dirt distances that were not practical with the dozer. 4.0 Costs
Costs were minimal. Some equipment repairs e.g. cylinders repacked,
hoses replaced, etc, fuel costs, and operator labor for the spots where this
inexperienced operator wasn't comfortable totaled less than $2000.
5.0 Lessons learned
a. It takes longer than
you think
b. If you are not experienced, hire an experienced operator for
the parts you can't handle
c. Don't be stubborn about (b) above.
d. Get
a level, transit, or way to easily shoot grade and shoot it often
e. Don't
guess or trust your eyes regarding (d) above.
f. Look carefully at any
older dam; it may be cheaper less work to start over, rather than repair
g.
Do not; do not allow any trees on your dam, no exceptions.
h. Remove trees
even those that are close to the dam
i. Allow plenty of time for
construction. I got caught short by fall rains and could not complete until
following spring. .
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