Finnie
Herd Master
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You’re welcome. Now I have a new person to stalk! On all the sites!
I Hate Green Briars!
- Thread starter Baymule
- Start date
Bruce
Herd Master
Sounds like something you might want to dredge out before letting it refill.
That's exactly one of the reasons we bought the tractor for and now realize that it probably can't handle the slope. LOL I kind wonder if goats/sheep could clear it out easier than we could by hand!
- Thread starter
- #144
Baymule
Herd Master
@Wyndsong here is my fence thread. Learn from my mistakes!
www.backyardherds.com
The 4” square woven sheep and goat wire is cheaper than the 2”X4” non climb wire and comes on a 300’ roll instead of a 200’ roll. Haha, I can give you lots of study material. @Finnie got you started!
Non-Climb 2"x4" Horse Wire Fence
There have been a lot of fence discussions here on BYH. As many of you know, my husband and I bought a home on 8 acres and moved 160 miles to be close to our DD, DSIL and our precious 2 grand daughters. There was nothing here but the house. Nothing. We had a house in town and acreage outside of...
www.backyardherds.com
The 4” square woven sheep and goat wire is cheaper than the 2”X4” non climb wire and comes on a 300’ roll instead of a 200’ roll. Haha, I can give you lots of study material. @Finnie got you started!
Bruce
Herd Master
4" Sheep and goat should keep out foxes, regular field fence with 6" openings will not. Yes I paid the price of not knowing that. Do NOT buy welded wire, it is weak.
What tractor and how much slope? I bought my Mahindra 1533 TLB to dredge out my pond behind the barn when it went dry. Used both the bucket and backhoe. The "base" was all muck, no traction on it but we are on ledge and I was going to stop any time I couldn't put the "pond end" bucket down and lift up that end of the tractor. As long as I dug out the muck down to the ledge I was good. Still I had to self rescue a few times and a couple of those I wasn't sure I wouldn't need to call Al down the road and have him pull me out. The slope wasn't too steep though. This picture might give you a decent comparison to yours. I was able to go in from 2 directions and eventually drive through on the left edge. Lots faster to come in from the south and drive the collected muck out the north east end to dump than back up and carry it around. This picture is when the pond is filling back up.
This picture is from when I had started to clean it out. You can see the cracked dry clay/muck I was digging out. When the pond is full it covers the bright green grass on the far side. I would have dug out more in that area but there was an issue with DW, DD1 and tadpoles. You can read about it in my journal. There is no water source other than snow melt and rain so it drops every year. On really dry years it went dry. Not great for the fish and frogs.
What tractor and how much slope? I bought my Mahindra 1533 TLB to dredge out my pond behind the barn when it went dry. Used both the bucket and backhoe. The "base" was all muck, no traction on it but we are on ledge and I was going to stop any time I couldn't put the "pond end" bucket down and lift up that end of the tractor. As long as I dug out the muck down to the ledge I was good. Still I had to self rescue a few times and a couple of those I wasn't sure I wouldn't need to call Al down the road and have him pull me out. The slope wasn't too steep though. This picture might give you a decent comparison to yours. I was able to go in from 2 directions and eventually drive through on the left edge. Lots faster to come in from the south and drive the collected muck out the north east end to dump than back up and carry it around. This picture is when the pond is filling back up.
This picture is from when I had started to clean it out. You can see the cracked dry clay/muck I was digging out. When the pond is full it covers the bright green grass on the far side. I would have dug out more in that area but there was an issue with DW, DD1 and tadpoles. You can read about it in my journal. There is no water source other than snow melt and rain so it drops every year. On really dry years it went dry. Not great for the fish and frogs.
Senile_Texas_Aggie
Herd Master
Miss @Wyndsong,
As Mr. @Bruce mentioned, he has a journal and it is well worth reading. It is located in Forums => Social (grouping) => Members "BackYardHerds" Journals => Bruce's Journal. Among his many other adventures, he describes in detail the fun he had in excavating his pond. It might give some ideas what to do or not do.
I hope you will consider starting a journal, if you haven't already. If you haven't done so already, could you mention in what part of the country you are located?
As for having lived in the city your whole life, that is what my Beautiful Gal and I did our whole until we retired and moved here to western Arkansas 3 years ago. So read other folks' threads for how to do things right, and read my thread for how to do things wrong!
Senile Texas Aggie
As Mr. @Bruce mentioned, he has a journal and it is well worth reading. It is located in Forums => Social (grouping) => Members "BackYardHerds" Journals => Bruce's Journal. Among his many other adventures, he describes in detail the fun he had in excavating his pond. It might give some ideas what to do or not do.
I hope you will consider starting a journal, if you haven't already. If you haven't done so already, could you mention in what part of the country you are located?
As for having lived in the city your whole life, that is what my Beautiful Gal and I did our whole until we retired and moved here to western Arkansas 3 years ago. So read other folks' threads for how to do things right, and read my thread for how to do things wrong!
Senile Texas Aggie
Bruce
Herd Master
Yep, STA and I are FAMOUS for earning the Zinger™ award! Do what we THINK we are going to do, not what we ACTUALLY do 
We've got a little Kubota. I think it's the smallest sized one. This is our pond... not sure if you can see the slope in this picture, and this was taken around the first of the year, the water is lower than what it shows now. The slope i'd say is probably 45 degrees maybe more? It's definitely not going to be easy getting down there on foot either.
The damn was broke when we bought the place, and they took the price to fix it off of the price of the house. We talked to a few landscaping companies and it'd be WAY too much to hire someone. But of course we have to figure out how to fix it ourselves. LOL I'm sure we'll have fun doing it after it starts getting cool again and the bugs go back to you know where!
Bruce
Herd Master
So you've got a BX subcompact. I think they are 4WD so that is good. Does it have a backhoe? If it does it makes self rescuing easier.
I agree, I wouldn't think once let alone twice about taking my tractor down that slope. You would have to dig a "road" down to it from farther out. If you don't have solid ground in the pond, I think it would be best to have a big winch set up to haul the tractor back when you lose traction. Drain the whole thing before you start.
It took me a lot of hours to get my pond cleaned out. The parts guy at the tractor dealer said he'd never seen someone come in for the 50 hour maintenance parts (filters) so soon.
I agree, I wouldn't think once let alone twice about taking my tractor down that slope. You would have to dig a "road" down to it from farther out. If you don't have solid ground in the pond, I think it would be best to have a big winch set up to haul the tractor back when you lose traction. Drain the whole thing before you start.
It took me a lot of hours to get my pond cleaned out. The parts guy at the tractor dealer said he'd never seen someone come in for the 50 hour maintenance parts (filters) so soon.
Cotton*wood
Loving the herd life
FYI
FYI: The 4 inch fencing will NOT keep out foxes. We have 4 inch fencing, and after one of the snows this last winter, traced the fox prints all over the property. They go right through the fence. And then this summer, saw one go through the fence. It's a shame.....
