Friday, May 11, 2012

Water channels and pond progress

April and May were very productive in our main garden.First I dug the water channels around the field so the water that used to flood the garden now drain in to the stream near by, unfortunately,  one third of the field is still unusable so after a long talk I decided to dig a pond and turn the water retaining ability into something productive ,growing eatable water plants,creating micro biotope  and home for small fish ,frogs ,crayfish and other amphibians and critters, also use it as the tank for plant irrigation ,I'm almost done with the general shape of the pond,but I would probably need help from my friend that have small shovel car to compact the walls and get some depth in the mid section,I hope that I don't need to use plastic liners except maybe in the deepest part due to more porous rockier bed,but it seems that there is better solution get some clay from our other rice pad and pack it on the top of the bottom.To prevent the pond to become stagnant I'm going to use existing old water irrigation pipe,currently closed and buried, but I managed to found where it is and probably going to excavate it soon,pipe is connected to the small spring from which all neighboring rice fields getting their water,good thing it's for free and constant all year long, in between pipe and pond I plan to put scavenged bath tub that will act as accumulating tank for watering if needed,It's higher than the pond itself so I was hoping to create small water fall if possible for some aeration, this will create small flow thru the pond thus eliminating need for the circulation pump,also there is constant breeze across the field that would help moving the water,on the other end I'll put adjustable drain pipe (Monk) that connects to the water channel and into the stream.   
 problematic soggy part of the field
with fresh water channels
(note that I had to fill back the right 
channel to increase strength of the wall of the pond )
 
front channel
 
whole pond  to be and raised beds from field above
(sorry for the angle)

 
from the back 
(intake side)

 
front side 
(drain side)

     





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