building a pond in Wisconsin
- Thread starter Ben.MN/WI
- Start date
john volkman
5 year old buck +
I live on the property so i do get to hunt it quite a bit, i try not to pressure it to much, some years i have lots of water others not but i usually have good duck hunting on it especially considering the size and location.
That's impressive. How big is your pond? The area I would like to add a pond is fed by a grass waterway in one direction and a trickle of water that flows under a road culvert in another direction. There's a slight seasonal type wetland currently there, but it's maybe 1/10 acre and surrounded primarily by reed canary grass. I think I could relatively easily get a 1/2 - 1 acre shallow pond if I could either dig out the current area a little or possibly increase the height of the outlet of that area by a couple of feet. It would be nice to end up with waterfowl numbers like you have.
john volkman
5 year old buck +
total water surface is about 6-7 acres when full, i live n door county wi and the limestone is very close to the surface so there is limited topsoil. The water is mostly fed thru the ground but the water table is what determines the pond depth. it was basically all ash trees and canary grass when we blocked the ditch with a berm that drained that portion of the property. killing canary grass is/was a full time job but you can knock it back, when you finally do lots of natives make their way back into the wetland.
My pond required a $25 permit from Portage county planning and zoning department. Larger ponds have more expensive permits. The important considerations for me were that I was not located within 300 feet of a lake or a class A trout stream. No problem, as I am in the middle of the Central Sands area and Wolf lake is 3/4 or more of a mile away.
I sat in a zoning meeting with another couple who had to get permission from federal agencies before they could build their pond. They told me it was a two year process at the time of the meeting.
I think you might run into permitting problems if the area is considered a wetland.
I sat in a zoning meeting with another couple who had to get permission from federal agencies before they could build their pond. They told me it was a two year process at the time of the meeting.
I think you might run into permitting problems if the area is considered a wetland.
Big Snow Man
5 year old buck +
My neighbor put a pond in and my suggestion would be to get a 3 ring binder for all your permits and applications. I’m 1000 yds at least from where he was going to dig and he said County was thinking about contacting me about his application. We had a few good laughs over this pond. Now the pond holds water in the spring and is bone dry in the fall. Lots of work for nothing.
