2.5 Acre Pond Gone!!! Ideas, tale, and restoral thread

[Stressless]

OK, short story. I started really stocking this pond in 2018 - It's been on the property for over 30 years - NEVER had a issue with it draining but no creek flowing it so it's a large pothole, water level varying by up to 2.5' over a year period.

In March of 2020 the local stock business came out with a load and he called - "your pond is gone"

Mid-Ohio - 1400'x 80' lake widest is 120' 2.5 Surface acres

I don't believe any fish will survive the current lake levels and weather

In Mar 2019 it went from

to Jan 2021 -

The shale drain that opened up.

It's a long narrowish 2.5 SA pond that took a bunch of 5#+ LMB out with it.

The Plan:

- hire excavator company to scoop out the ridge going down the middle of long pond an build a 8'-10' bermed road on the spoil bank side 12" above planned lake level
-- Every 300' put a 20'x20' landing coming out from the Spoil side and incorporating the 8'-10' wide road Lake is 1400' long. Put 3 landings in
- put 6'PVC drain in the existing seep, Plug (first big question) and build 6"PVC snorkel drain 6" above old lake level
- hire the local stoking CO - I'm pretty sure I'd want this to be a smallmouth and walleye perch and bluegill lake adding forage yearly

So now I've got two requests

- How to plug the hole correctly to ensure the 6' PVC doesn't get comrimised and the shale is plugged far enough to prevent alternate seepage

- What would you stock with and why?

 

[Ohiosam]

Pack bentonite clay around the pvc pipe to limit seepage around it.

 

[Stressless]

Yes sir. I plan to put it above waterline 15' each way and below the current opening by at least 3'. Big bentonite cap with the pipe coming out, I think I can get about 8' into the seep with a 6" sch 40 PVC, pack clay along at least 6' of pipe and 2' thick on the cap.

I know whats on thr other side of this 150' wall, that caused this to flow. It's at the apex of a V dig so everything else is extremely thick.

 

[tracker 6]

Old mine opening ?

 

[Stressless]

No, strip mine high wall from '45 -'50, 70 years old or so.

 

[tracker 6]

What made the hole ? The reason I brought that is that there was hole like that I saw where creek would go in and show up on the other side of the ridge.It was a old mine shaft uncovered by stripmining. lot of them in coal country

 

[Stressless]

A pond on the far side, dam gave way, the water was leveled between the ponds via that seep, when the other pond washed out, the seep got bigger and drained 2.5 SA to < 1/4 SA that was 'alot' of water thru that hole!

 

[Stressless]

Here's the updated story as it applies to this project.

Two ponds, Neighbors Pond (NP) and Long Pond (LP), surface elevation in Mar 2019 were 5' different - Neighbor pond was 5' lower than LP.

When the dam blew out of NP, it dropped NP level by about 10', LP by about 7'. Also in a 4-5 month period since NP dam failure another pond Figure8 Pond (F8P) water level dropped by 6' as well - it is about 120' from LP. In the Mar 2019 GOOGLE EARTH surface elevation, or height above MSL, of F8P it was the exact same height above MSL as LP so this activity 'should' fix both ponds water level issues. We are debating on raising the water level in Long Pond by 1' or 12" with the new overflow in Long Pond keeping the MSL surface height of both LP and F8P constant, they might go below the overflow in drought but will not go above that height which might have contributed to the cascading failure.

The plan changed over the last year in a couple key areas:
- Creating an overflow to the East of LP instead of through the highwall seep
- Creating a overflow on NP to regulate the height and prevent another catastrophic failure
- Closing and packing the seep with plug material including bentonite + 2' thick clay layer above and below the identified seep and 30' laterally
- Using Beaver resistant overflows to mitigate the ponds height rising and flows across the dams

My neighbor had a strip mine pond that didn't have an overflow, the water just ran over the berm of the "dam" which was a road used when the area was stripped in the late 40's 50's. Then reused as a forestry timber road since... O/A April 2019 the water flowing over the berm had cut through the berm enough to become a catastrophic flow and cut the berm about 20' wide and 12' deep (yellow X)losing the retention pressure and allowing the seep thru the highwall to flow unabated (red dots and arrow). The aqua dot and arrows are the new overflows to manage the surface heights of NP and LP.

Went thru Pond Boss and some other forums to review ideas and get some new ideas on how to attack this problem. Got several recommendations on a Amish pond/lake builder and had him out in Mar 20 to get a perspective on how to attack the problem (he'll be referred to as the Contractor) and he wasn't positive on just trying to fix the problem on my land. Talked it over with the neighbor and we agreed to have the contractor out again and look at the catastrophic failure on his berm.

We all met in early June walked the berm and reviewed where to get fill etc to fix that NP problem and perhaps raise the NP level 12"-18" on his side. We all shook hands and walked away from the problem with a positive sense that we could not only fix this mess but improve the outcome, add preventative measures so that it doesn't happen again and improve the quality and accessibility of both ponds.

I talked with the contractor this AM and should have a quote by the end of the week. Tentative start date on the project will be the first week of August starting with the work on the LP side, creating an overflow from Long pond to the natural fall line on my property to the East/SouthEast.

I'll be updating this thread (if) the quote comes in as expected and we move forward. Taking a knee and saying a lil' prayer that this will go as planned and the issues that can be mitigated are being done.

If it works as planned, then I'll revisit the re-stocking plan for the fishery in LP and F8P.

Asking for folks to red team this, this is a one chance, expensive endeavor so all observations are encouraged.

"Why Red Teaming? The premise of [Red Teaming] is that people and organizations court failure in predictable ways, that they do so by degrees, almost imperceptibly, and that they do so according to their mindsets, biases, and experience, which are formed in large part by their own culture and context. The sources of these failures are simple, observable, and lamentably, often repeated. They are also preventable, and that is the point of ‘red teaming’."

 

[Buckmaster]

Have you consulted with your county extension office? Aka water and soil department. They used to provide site assistance and planning.

 

[Stressless]

Have you consulted with your county extension office? Aka water and soil department. They used to provide site assistance and planning.

yes sir and the engineering dept - both gave me the other offices #

Looking to get a cement truck out with boom like you pour a foundation. Plug the NP side with couple bags of quickcrete and shoot the slurry into the LP void side to plug +130' with hydraulic cement figure .75' opening 150' long at the outside Volume = π×.752×150 = 265.1 feet3 =~ 10 cubic yards of cement if it flows proper thru the void. let that harden and cap the LP side with a large patch of bentonite. Cover the whole thing with 2' of clay top to bottom and 30' to the sides.

So if everything works out, dam redone in NP, plug works in LP we'll have to drain the rest of the water out of LP to do the work in LP. So the amount of rain water to replenish that pond is based off the surface area that drains into it(531,000sqft)/a permeability ratio, /1000(sq ft) X 620 (1' of rain in 1000sqft = 620 gallons of water or .62 gallons/sqft) in an impermeable surface...

The figures for the touched-up i.e., completed LP are avg 11' deep, 65' wide, 1100' long = 5,875,155.00 us gallons.

With no "permeability" 1" of rain in the LP watershed would produce 531,000 x .62 = 329,220 gallons. or ~ 5.6% of the LP volume.

TOO gets on avg 40" of rain a year so 40" x 5.6% = 224% of LP volume with no loss/ permeability so it'll take, most likely ~ 1 -> 1.5 years to fill LP to the overflow or 224% - 360% of LP water volume with loss and permeability.

 

[Buckmaster]

Were did you source your bentonite Clay? I had to buy mine in 50# bags. Expensive. I could not find bulk.

 

[Stressless]

@Buckmaster no bulk source - the betonite is only being used around the cement plug in LP and a couple feet around that 3-4 50# bags, the reg clay for the clay cap 2'x20'x60' is being sourced as we dig the center of the pond out for the road on the East side and clay cap on the West or highwall side.

 

[Buckmaster]

I had a leak in my pond shoreline; tree roots and muskrat cause of problem. I bought about 20 bags of bentonite and spread it over the ice on that corner. Upon ice melt it sealed that site. No issue since.

 

[5Cent]

I'll be.....thats interesting after all this time.

 

[CJD3]

That's quite a story and project.
Best of luck on it!

 

[Stressless]

Looking forward to getting LP back in the fishery. This is a 7.5# caught in LP 2016, prolly was close to 9# when it blew out 2020...

 

[Stressless]

First draft of the quote to fix the ponds came back - very encouraging. Need to get some more details and context into writing but we should be underway by the end of the month!

 

[Stressless]

Two bentonite pumpers from the oil patch contacted working the stick to get an agreement - no standard for them but not necessarily unheard of.

Contractor and I discussed it a couple times. I urged him to get BOG and eyes on it again - I want the quote to be fair for the work. He came back yesterday and brought a small hoe - He got that stuck in the first 20' = he went and got his big hoe and dug the little hoe out. No damage to any equipment but his ego was a lil' bruised. I've seen enough equipment operators working to see he's good, SO we both chatted and have a 75% plan.

The "seep" is at least 20' 18"x10" which is actually good for the bentonite pumpers they can mix a heavier specific gravity to plug better.

We should be at work in a couple weeks.

 

[Stressless]

We should be pumping water out of the 1/4 acre left, starting today! - the excavator noticed a couple LARGE catfish in that survived the 1/4A last winter so that'll be interesting.

Dropping a couple $5,000 bills to getrdone so any thoughts or advice along the way is GREATLY appreciated as this goes over the next 2-3 weeks.

 

[giles]

Sell them to a local pay lake.