Building a 4.5 acre farm pond. FarmCraft101
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- Опубликовано: 30 июл 2024
- We built a pond on our farm a few years ago. It was a great addition! The pond is 4.5 acres and has a creek flowing into it. That means it is large enough that is doesn't get gross, and we fish and swim in it. It cost a fair amount, but it also doubles as water storage so I can irrigate my fields in summer droughts.
For those interested, we paid $25k, which includes clearing of the site, burning brush, building the dam, including pipe cost and installation. That's a lot of money, but I figure I would rather drive my dodge pickup and own a pond, rather than driving a lexus. ;-) The pipe is schedule 40 PVC, 12" horizontal, 18" riser. Why is the riser bigger? A vertical pipe in this configuration won't fill completely or flow efficiently. Basically, the 12" pipe carries just as much water as the 18" pipe can deliver to it. And 12" is MUCH cheaper than 18".
We stocked the pond with fish about 1 year after it filled, allowing the sediments to settle and wash out first. We added a typical fish combination for our area, of bass, bluegill, sunfish, and catfish.
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The cost to have this lake built is less than the difference between a hundred acres w water and w/o. This way is so much better because you get to choose where it goes on the land and the shape which makes how the house is positioned exactly what I have in mind sitting on the front porch watching the sunset
Keep in mind, lower quality water doesn't add much more than the cost of construction. If you wish to see significant property appreciation, a highly aesthetic pond with a great fishery will perform the best.
My grandma just sold the family property and pond. It was 8 acres and so beautiful, now I’m on a mission to find some land with a creek so I can build my piece of heaven.
My 1/4 acre pond took 16 months to fill up with no creek and hardly any runoff from land. Nice lake-Great price!
How much did it cost to dig out your 1/4 acre pond?
beautiful pond. 25k not bad for such a big pond.
Dude, that is inspiring and impressive! Thanks for sharing! It gives me hope for my upcoming baby pond on our new 1.25 acre homestead. We just have to wait for the ground to thaw.
FarmCraft101...fabulous pond and wildlife conservation area...greets from N-E PA.
Fascinating! I've watched many pond construction videos but I've never seen that described the design of a pond. Very well done video.
That is typical for "how to" videos on youtube. For most of them it is their very first pond !
This is the best video I've seen yet! You actually gave info as well a cost. Thanks so much!
4.5 acres is big for a pond. Build a boat house on that inland sea!
Shhhhhl... 4 acres is smalllll, everyone needs to wish for a 38237 acre pond! ;)
Bet the downstream neighbors were thrilled. Worlds 5th greatest dog-I have the first four. The pond is beautiful btw.
Nice size lake and very reasonable price for that size. I wish I had a creek flowing through our property.
Nice! I am in the beginning stages of seeing what its going to take to expand my pond. Looks like a waterfowlers heaven;)
Great video! Thanks for sharing the project details.
We lack water in Denmark after 13 weeks of summer heat and almost no precipitation - in fact, I think that the water shortage applies throughout Europe.
The drought here in 2018 will set its footsteps far in the future, for plants and trees are in distress.
The birds have done well, but fish kill has taken the headlines, and here I speak of tons after tons of dead fish.
Rather much water than nothing ... as long as you can control the water masses.
Beautiful lake you have made - will not call it a pont.
Good luck with the projekt - 25K is well-spent - you and nature are the winners.
I'm sure England did all right.
Wow that is cool! thanks for shearing that! Sweet All around!
Jim/England. You cease to amaze me! Outstanding.
Absolutely love it. Well worth the $! Enjoy
$25k is a fantastic price for 4.5 acres. I've been quoted close to that for 1 acre. Awesome pond!
On flat ground 25k/acre won't usually even include the seal. This project did not mention any expense for sealing Most ponds need it!
This is awesome!!
Great video
great video! just found your channel. we just built a pond and atta ed it to our existing 1.5 acre pond. just waiting for rain now! where are you at? terrain very similar to ours. we're in far, far southern illinois near Kentucky. thanks
Nice. It looked like quite a small stream. I guess you have to allow some of the water to continue through so the down stream doesn't dry up while the pond fills.
Thanks. There is actually a small side stream that comes into the main stream just below the dam, so I didn't have to worry about it drying up. During dry spells the feeding stream might get down to 3-5 gpm, with a lot more during rains obviously, but there's so much water in the pond that takes quite a while to fill!
Wow that is cool! I built a pond too much smaller and all natural.
That was cool!
It is a beautiful dam.
In Aus, it is desirable to keep livestock away from dams (manure, bogging up banks, getting stuck etc...) so where possible a concrete or plastic watering trough is installed fed from the dam, with stock still permitted access to the dam at a stabilised area in case the trough runs dry for some reason. Ours prefer to drink from the trough.
This can be achieved by tapping into your horizontal pipe (cap off, of course) and could also be used for irrigation if required.
Do you not need this facility at your location?
Have you heard of, or read P.A. Yeomans book 'Water for Every Farm"?
Great video, thanks for sharing!
25k isn't bad at all, very nice!
great vid buddy!
Great video
and thats going to be a favorite of the birds
what do you think of a pond desighned to seasonally be lower and higher, enough for a shore ecosystem to develop?
like how marshes and the homes of the wood oysters are,
with the rest of the pond having some type of regular foliage, growth, like lillypads for eating the rootstock?
Thank you for sharing now I know have an idea what a cost to build it thank you👍
This guy has obviously not priced Dodge pickups in a while. ;)
Dam, that is a nice dam. Hehehehe
How do you design the size of the dam by what the top width, depth, base width in relation to the volume of water to store? Could you share hows it calculated ? Thanks.
thanks for the video. Did you completely stop the creek flow below your dam for 4.5 months while filling?
Put in an aeration system and some fish, give it a full year or two and start fishing. The amount of time you give it will depend on the size of the fish you'll take out of it on that first cast. Bigger is better. Truly Im not sure I could wait.
Could always plant water plants to skip the aeration part since they'll create oxygen instead. Wait maybe a month for the plants to adjust and release enough oxygen for life to survive, then add some fish.
impressive!
4.5 acre is a big lake and beautiful ...in 4/5 months incredible they're saying here it takes 1/3 yrs to complete a 7 acre lake
To keep the lake clean, it must be regularly cleaned of silt and algae. This can be done with a dirty water motor pump and a Bagermaster suction nozzle.
What sort of soil is on top and is there clay further down? Did you have the guy create an emergency overflow (low area on the damn with concrete under dirt so it can washout and not ruin the dam?)
Do you take the the pipe out and the pond is good or do you leave it in and it keeps filling
I'm not sure I understand your question, but the pipe stays in place. As water runs into the pond from the creek and rains, it flows out through the vertical pipe.
Oh ok I understand now thanks
It looks great!
I want put a small pond ,about 1ac pond, on my property, but wonder how much it will cost. If anyone has experience about pond; please share. Thanks.
awesome.
Impressive.
You shouldn't play favorites with your dogs. World's 100,000,000th best owner :)
Did all the water come from rainfall? Thanks for sharing!
Suppose you did not have a creek running through your property , would you still be able to have the same pond you have now ( depth width and all..)if it was just from rain water runoff?
Depends on the catchment area. Possibly.
WOW. Beautiful. Our 1.5 acre pond was here when we bought our place and is fed by 3 springs. I could never imagine it would take this kind of work. Great job and well worth every penny. Thanks for the video, especially the aerials. Did you end up adding any triploid carp to keep down the algae?
I think I will be going more for about 3000 gallons, probably wont fish for koi. ;)
Sir at 200.00 dollars per hour how much would this cost to do on an open field?
I'm curious if the flow of the creek was stopped completely until the pond filled? Seems like someone with the EPA or other Govt entity would have a conniption over that.
Do you guys have aeration in the pond?
Did you have to buy a water right for this
I live in Southern Missouri on a hill and my land is red clay dirt and rock. Behind my house is a ravine surrounded on three sides. Rain from the surrounding land obviously flows through this area and I've been thinking that I'd like to dam one side to create a pond for either fishing and/or livestock. Would I contact an engineer to determine if it will hold water and if it would be feasible? If so, what type of engineer or who?
In my area, red clay is considered ideal for dam building. Does your soil drain well, or does it puddle a lot? I assume it puddles if it is mostly clay. From what you describe I don't think you would have a problem building a pond. You could definitely contact a soil engineer but that would likely add several thousand dollars to your project. I would talk to some contractors that have built ponds in your area and see what they say. If multiple contractors are confident that they wouldn't have any problems, then I'd go with the one I liked best. If they seem a little doubtful, might be worth hiring the engineer first. There are various resources I found online that let you calculate your water flow. In your case, you would need to know average rainfall and the number of acres draining into your ravine, and also the type of soil. But a good experienced contractor would probably be able to give you a lot of info just during the estimate.
The main cost of the project will by the size of your dam, and how many yards of dirt they have to move. Also, make sure you check to see what permits or approvals you need. Good luck.
25k Is Great Price For This Work Of Art
Totally agree!
How does the water not seep away from your pond / lake? Did you have to line the bottom with anything? Great idea about leaving the big riock to form an island!!
No lining necessary. Unless you have really sandy soil, water will only penetrate so deep before it slows to a negligible trickle. Dirt is heavier than water, after all, so the deeper you get in the dirt, the higher the pressure. If I recall correctly, I read somewhere that the water will only penetrate about 18" into the dirt. But whatever the depth, once the dirt is saturated to a depth where the pressure of the dirt exceeds the pressure of the overlying water, very little water will percolate through. There is a creek that feeds the pond, so even if I lose a small amount of water to percolation, I have more coming in than I lose.
Thanks for your reply. I have a red clay soil where I am so I will probably just try and compact the clay at the bottom of the pond before filling. I don't have a water source and I'm considering digging a well dedicated to keeping the pond level at an even level during the hot summer months. Evaporation can be a big problem.
This is such an ambitious project! How did you learn how to do this and how it works? It looked like the water just naturally appeared. I had the space, time and money to do this! I made a 250 litre pond in the garden it is tiny.
I talked to a lot of people and read a lot about it. I live in an agricultural area, so there are quite a few ponds similar to this built in the area. I considered doing it entirely by myself, buying a track loader to move the dirt. But once I calculated the amount of material that the dam would require, I realized that was a bad idea. Its around 5000 yards of dirt! So I hired contractors to come in. Even with their huge trucks, dozers, and pans, it took them 2 weeks with 3-4 machines running to make the dam. Glad you enjoyed! Thanks for watching!
How deep is it? You might just be able to drop a motorboat or even a small sailboat in it. It's kind of a wild dream of mine to be able to do something like that in my own backyard if I were actually rich... Lol
For 25k that isn’t to shabby, I’d say it was well worth it
As someone who managed a small fleet of lifts at a rental shop I don't think I've ever seen that mechanism explained that clearly well done!
Super!!!!!!!!
Do you have any tips for someone looking to do something similar to what you did?
Get permits!
How do you keep the water from seeping into the ground? Thanks!
Red clay as explained in the video ;) Most likely the entire area is more or less made up from a clay type soil by the looks of it. Apart from that you only need to replenish the water that seeps away, so it don't matter if the water seeps into the ground because the stream is more then capable to keep up with it.
what state are y'all located ? Here in NC i've heard of people getting quoted 20 k for an acre. Beautiful pond though!
20k / acre is fairly typical across the nation for the initial excavation on a flat site, that does not usually even address sealing the basin more at aquahabitat.com/techfaqs.html
what part of the world do you live in? Did you need a permit or an environ,ental study? I'm wondering about the downstream people during the months when the stream was not running much because of filling the pond
It's a tiny creek, and joins another creek before it leaves my property. Nobody down stream noticed anything, but even so I got a permit.
Just do it... like nike
is the water clear similar to a natural lake? or is it very muddy?
Fairly clear. Occasional algae blooms in the summer will make it turbid. Rarely it gets muddy if it's been raining hard for a long time.
I would love to one day have a pond where I can have bluegills, bass, catfish of all sorts, trout, Pike, and I know they say it's invasive and bad but I would love some Carp and Chad and...you get it a whole ton of species. Wonder if it's doable or even legal in any state :/
How did you fill it?
I love your videos. Think I have watched them all. How big is your farm in acress? Do you make a living on the RUclips channel in most or by doing farming? Just asking since I sant to start a YT channel and I try to get some inspiration. I really love your videos, great fixes, great humor, and you seem like a kind and nice person. Best wishes from Norway.
by what week was anything alive in the water?
Immediately. It was a creek with frogs and minnows to start with, so they just spread out. I stocked it with fish a few months after it finished filling. Thanks for watching!
Where is it at? Texas?
These do have a practice lifespan. They wont last forever. Water seeps around the pipes if no anti-seep collars or sand bedding and will move soil causing pipe failure. Pipes also clog with debris or just get smashed in general. Large storm events can cause over topping and erode berms. Sediment reduces storage capacity over time making the volume of water required for overtopping less and less. Water will work its way around or under the core and find it's own way out. Appurtenances get broken, buried, lost over time or with the change in ownership. I see references to the EPA here but the USDA is going to want to know what you're up to if you're converting crop or forest land already enrolled in their programs. I would contact your NRCS office for assistance. At least ask for a list of contractors in the area. Document every single conversation you have with people about the project. Full names, agencies/companies, dates, times, conversations, contact info. People leave agencies and suddenly that person who told you you don't need a permit is gone and it turns out they were lazy garbage and yes now you need an after-the-fact permit that costs twice as much. Take the time to read permitting requirements. Dont' assume your contractor has done so. The landowner is the one who faces fines. Aerial imagery is amazing at this point and you it gets harder and harder to beg for forgiveness rather than ask for permission. They have leaf-on and leaf-off imagery so you're not hiding anything. Agencies hire interns in the summer just to look for that kind of thing. Set up a maintenance plan to at the very least inspect these things after large storm events. It's a lot easier to fix small damage yearly and remove debris and youll catch that clogged intake before there's a problem. If it's man-made and naturally occurring than it's doomed to fail despite your best efforts.
Your kidding right! That's why he bought so much land to get away from everything you said.
Y'all doing some fishin?
some intense pond music.
Hi. Do you have source of water or that is surface water?
A small creek feeds it.
The price of this pond looks like it included building a dam and clearing land. Most ponds need to be sealed which can cost much more. Site soil conditions are important. The rest of the cost of a *quality* pond / lake includes creating the habitat for long-term clear water and large fish plus other recreation. The final cost is not realized until at least 10 years later if weed problems begin. We always suggest that ponds on a tight budget be kept murky to avoid weed problems. Of course that doesn't help fish growth, but you get what you pay for. More on pond and lake costs at www.aquahabitat.com/techfaqs.html Cheers!
I've got a 3/4 acre pond on my place. Can I trade it in for something bigger?
step 1: trade money for a digger
step 2: start diggin'
I have a rock and sand contractor wanting to dig a 4 acre pond on my 24 acre property which is out off town limits (Texas). He will pay X for dump truck of dirt taken out, and build the pond. Has anyone heard of anybody doing this?
How does it get filled? Also is this for farming water as well as human consumption?
There is a creek that runs into it. It's is for farming primarily. Thanks for watching.
About how much per acres would does it cost.
read the description he paid $25,000 so just do the math ... which is about the same I see on most videos about $10,000 an acre but depends on what exactly is going on ...with the land it's self
most ppl won't say how much they paid ..I'm glad he did
Correction: Cost $25k for 4.5ac = $5,556/ac
can i come fishing here? this pond is awesome!
that is so cool! did you put any fish in there?
read the description above bluegil, bass, catfish, sunfish
Me to
Do you need any license or permit to do this, I know our fed owns everything specially water. Nice pond, What are you planning to do with it?
I just heard of a guy who got permission from authorities, then had the EPA threaten to fine him because he didn't get permission from the corp of engineers. He won his case. It depends on the jurisdiction and how much they want to hassle you I think. Every one is different. Talk to the county reps where you want to build it.
I guess it depends on where you live. I had to get a permit to build a 7 acre lake.
update please!
Who built it, I cant find a soul in York, SC who will actually show up?
When I buy property I would like to have one acre pond or Lake. Made 2 feet deep just so I can run my RC boats in At that is the only reason why I would want a lake or a Pond
What's a fair amount? Can you PM me? I'm having a hard time finding land with a pond in my area - this may be my only option.
It was about 25k total, and I got a really good deal because I had it done during a slow economic time, and contractors were hungry for work. So much depends on the topography and how many yards of dirt have to be moved to make the dam.
Thanks for the update. I'm looking to start a small farm with my family, sold our house last month - I can't afford more than about 10-30 acres anything more is in the millions of dollars range. Then I have the cost to build a house. You really helped me out, watching this video - they did a great job. Thanks for uploading the video.
25k seriously? how long ago? I need to do this!
It was around 7 years ago. I got a pretty good deal. It was during the recession and contractors were hungry for work. Cost is all about the size of your dam, and the size of the pond is all about the topography. I was lucky. My dam is only around 200 feet long and contains 6000 yards of clay. That's a pretty small dam to make a 4.5 acre pond.
Rough cost?
read the description he said $25,000
If they put barley in it thrle water will become clear. Bails of barley at the entrance will filter the water.
I didn't know that. Cool tip!
I thought I had the world's greatest dog.
Nope. I've thought about it and I agree with myself. Mine is officially the greatest! ;-)
My dog is king 👑 of all dogs
Nice pond btw
You’re wrong they are all worlds greatest dogs
25k!? I got a 30k quote for 1 ac in tennessee.
All depends on the size of the dam. They had to move about 6000 yards of dirt for my dam if I remember right, and the pipe cost about $3k. My topography was favorable in that the dam was relatively short to fill a large area.
Must not be in Colorado. Here if you do anything with water, everyone crys and complains to makes sure your not going to effect what ever thing they care about. Even with everything legit they still bitch and complain.
Your completed project is spectacular btw.
Wondering if the EPA bothered you for building that. I just read a story of a guy who they threatened to fine thousands of dollar a day until he took it out. He had a creek flowing through his as well. He won the case though and it gets to stay. He had gotten permission from some authorities first, but they wanted him to deal with the corp of engineers too. Worries me because I am looking to get off of this hillside into flatter land soon and wanted a pond.
I did my research and got a permit before I started, and didn't have any trouble. One thing I recall was they wanted to be sure my creek was small enough that it didn't have a name, and that my dam wasn't higher than a certain amount. 17 feet I think. It may have helped that I'm on a farm and using it for irrigation as well. I think people that have trouble are often neglecting to follow some rule. I would definitely make sure you have a permit in writing before starting. I wonder if your example built his dam too high or just didn't actually get a permit first. Good luck.
Thank you. I don't know. Interesting about the creek name though. I never would have thought of that being an issue. Guess you'll have to make a little secret pet name for it. Enjoy your beautiful land!
Great... so you stopped the flow of a natural stream! Do you have any idea of what happens when you block one of your arteries??
This is more like pinching your arm until it tingles and then let go and things are back to normal in no time.
it doesnt have a pond liner. the water level will not hold. dry summer means dry pond.
Phu; I guess you didn't watch the video...its lined with clay...it will never leak...that's how we build lakes/ponds
How many ecosystems were destroyed throughout duration of filling pond? We must consider the bigger impact of our actions
Why do you ASSume that we didn't consider the impact? No ecosystems were destroyed. The creek that feeds the pond has another feeder just below the dam, so it never dried up during filling. The creek does occasionally go dry during a summer drought anyway.
Should have just got a beaver.
Normally artificial dams cause some types of ecological problems in the long term.
1) Any latest update about this lake now?
2) Did you take any steps to prevent the water from evaporating?
3) If possible, Please post the GPS coordinates of this lake, So i can see the latest status on Google Maps.
2) Did you take any steps to prevent the water from evaporating?
He turns the sun off between 10am and 2pm.
If only you had made it 5 acres, just think.
00:05: Huh weird I can't hear anything. *Turns sound up*
00:08: Is it just really quiet? *turns sound up higher* What's go-
00:10: EWITOUOORWIEJGOEIRJOGEIRHGEROHEGR