Building Fish Pond down under with a J.D.Compact

[OzGrasshopper]

Hi All, thought i'd share a "works in progress" here as i build a second fish pond with our little JD 3120, during our "dry" season b4 the winter rains come. This has been one of the driest years on record so gives a great opportunity to build this, while having to work around the last of the water. It never ceases to amaze me how much earth these little 4 w.d. tractors can handle.

The idea here is to enlarge a previously small livestock water hole into a fish pond deep enough for fish to survive our hot summers.

From this:-

to something like this existing pond:-

The new pond will be lengthened at each end and along the long side and have soils so removed added to bank height on 3 sides. Its a bit tricky cos there is still a bit of water in the bottom to work around.

Cutting out the north end....

Getting some extra depth in and building top wall steeper & higher. Unfortunately have hit a rock ledge in top left corner, but we'll work around that.

Stockpiling soil ready to take around to front wall.

Finished job, on north end with water quickly filling in....cutting long side is next job...will keep u posted.
cheers OG.

 

[pat32rf]

Is that clay or sandy soil?
A project like yours is a lot easier with all that open space. I worked on mine for about 4 summers (dry season) as the water went down. Finally borrowed an OLD 680Case 2wd hoe to deepen things a bit moreas it wasn't drying out enough to get little "Johnie" into the hole AND back out with a load.

Love that house in the background! What are your temperature highs and lows? Wish we had a wrap around porch like that to keep the snow and rain at bay.....

 

[Runner]

Wow! Beautiful place you have there.

Looks like a lot of work, but worth it in the end.

I want a pond so bad I can taste it (taste kind of like fish...).

 

[OzGrasshopper]

Hi pat32rt, soil on the farm varies a lot, ironstone cap with heavy underlying clay on the ridges - as where the house is = no water. hollows have a shallow growning zone of grey sandy loam maybe 1ft deep where grass grows, then deep white sand that bottoms out on what we call "coffee rock" (decaying ironstone), water usually follow over that hard surface, hence the need to get the cover off. evaporation is high in summer, but i have a 130ft deep bore that has a good constant supply of cool 12degree water that keep water temps down & allows fish to survive. we produce an average of 18 units of solar power per day, enough for us, farm & some excess to sell off. also solar hot water.
we are in a cooler part of Oz, winter day mins around 54fh (12cl) winter nites 45fh (7cl) summer day 85fh (30cl) summer nites 60fh (16cl). about 4 days a year we maybe reach 100fh (38cl). Our home is well insulated to keep summer heat down - hence verandah all round, & with a log fire on in mid May to mid August we keep the house about 60fh to 80 fh. we only use fans in summer do not need aircon like folk north of us. a very pleasant climate.

Hi Runner, we have just under 100 acres of farm land, very, very small by Oz standards, had 190 lost lot to govt for public works, but were very fairly compensated. we have intensive farming of cattle, deer, hay & now fish. i'm mid 60 so its enough work to keep me active & i enjoy the now casual lifestyle.

thanx u both for ur interest more pics soon as we progress. cheers OG.

 

[20 20]

thanks for sharing, I wish my soil was that easy to dig .

 

[OzGrasshopper]

Now cutting the bank on the high side to get extra width and moving this fill around to heighten the front wall:-

Building the front wall up has its moments when backing along the bank & u feel a bit of slip in the fill!!

Progess as looking over the pond....still lot of fill needed...

Deepening of the other end will provide a lot of spoil.... should get that done next week.

cheers OzG.

 

[TripleR]

Very impressive job.

 

[bindian]

Awesome job OzG.:thumbsup: I know you are having fun with this project. I built a small pond and it can be found here.....http://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/projects/135413-i-finally-started-my-pond.html
hugs, Brandi

 

[OzGrasshopper]

Hi Brandi, ur project has certainly been a journey 4 u, that little M tractor had a lot harder work to do with clay than my sandy soil. however ur clay will IMO when it settles down hold water well, i have to keep topping up thru summer here. we have 90,000lt rainwater tank and over 500sqm of roofing which produces about 3X water we need, so overflow from that tank plus a bore hooked to solar panels means water is not too much of an issue so far, but as ur finding, this is all a journey into the unknown, every pond is different.
i recon theres 2 parts to life - either do & find out for better or worse, or think about it & never know.... i think us doers have more fun:laughing:
cheers OzG

 

[Kyle_in_Tex]

It is amazing how much soil you have moved with your tractor considering it's size. Small fish(tractor) in a big pond! Enjoying the pics. Thanks for posting. Really neat to hear from people half a world away that do much of the same that we do in these parts. Wasn't it about a month ago that Queensland was about to flood/float away from all their rain? I guess that's on the other side of the country from you.