How low is you water level?

[Stoneheartfarm]

A lot of places have been way down. It's been strange around here, one lake will be way down and another will be full. I was out sinking some post holes the other day and it had rainedd for a couple of days before. The ground was pretty wet until I got about a foot down. Then it turneed just as dry as dust.

Steve

[donh]

Here in South Central Florida, all ponds are water table ponds - there are few springs, no runoff, no ravines or valleys to dam. You dig a hole and have a pond. The water table varies with the season and rainfall, but is from 2' to 8' deep. We don't seal our ponds with liners or clay; there would be no water in them. It all seeps in from the water table. This was a source of frustration for me when I first started to research how to make a pond -- it took a lot of digging (pun intended) before I started to find information on excavated ponds.

The primary reason we dig ponds (other than watering livestock) is to get a cheap source of fill to raise the house pads, etc., to the required levels. Either dig a pond or have it all hauled in - I'm waiting for the results of the septic tank application, but it looks like I will have to raise the house and barn pads about 36" or more.

All that said, since I'm going to have a pond, I really want the water level in the pond to remain constant - helps control the mosquitos for one thing, plus it makes it easier to maintain and looks better. To do that, I'll have to supplement it from a well. We can get lots of well volume going down 40' or less, but the water has a lot of tannin in it. At this level, it's used primarily for irrigation. To get good looking and tasting water, we have to go down 60' to 80' and tap the aquifer - essentially an underground river.

Most of the wells use surface jet pumps. But, since we're going to be refilling the pond, supplying the house and barn, trenching pvc pipe around the 5 acres for hose hookups, and installing a sprinkler system around the house, my well guy is going to put in a 4" well with a submersible pump. He guarantees I'll have enough water to run a small village. He figures to tap the aquifer at around 65'.

We'll rig a float in the pond to turn the water supply on and off. Other than the cost of electric to run the pump, there's really not much loss - the water we pump into the poond will mostly seep back down to the aquifer, or be lost to evaporation and come back down somewhere else as rain.