Apart from concreting our fish pond ,what can we do to hold the water in the very sandy soils of Northern Isaan?

Similar question for a medium sized ornamental pool (still about 5 x15 meter,but shallow (max 1.5 meter.) A pool plastic would be used in the USA in this case ,but I have not seen any in Thailand -am I missing something.

I remember reading in a thread here a few months ago about something like that. Sorry I can't recall the details. Maybe in a thread about koi ponds? Try a search for it. Good luck.

Found the thread later.. http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/index.php?sh...c=31378&hl=pond

Apart from concreting our fish pond ,what can we do to hold the water in the very sandy soils of Northern Isaan?

Similar question for a medium sized ornamental pool (still about 5 x15 meter,but shallow (max 1.5 meter.) A pool plastic would be used in the USA in this case ,but I have not seen any in Thailand -am I missing something.

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Please report back on what you found and decided and how it worked....lots of interest on this one. I'm especially interested in how you seal the big pond and how much it costs.

Soils in this part of Isaan are clay so dig a few test holes and you may be lucky and have natural water retention.

I am looking to get a big pond dug up in Khampaeng Phet province measuring around 20 x 10 x 6 metres as a storage facility and also as a sort of fish farm. I am not sure if it will leak and if so how to stop it.

Anybody have experience of this or any ideas?

I am looking to get a big pond dug up in Khampaeng Phet province measuring around 20 x 10 x 6 metres as a storage facility and also as a sort of fish farm. I am not sure if it will leak and if so how to stop it.

Anybody have experience of this or any ideas?

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I'm no expert on this but I think I'd check out all of the wells in your neighborhood and find out where the water level is at various times of the year. It could be that you will hit ground water before you get to 6 metres...in my neighborhood the ground water level never goes below about 3 meters...but the locals say that we are lucky to have this and that most places it goes deeper. In the Isaan forum along time ago a poster called 'mixedbreed' talked about hiring someone in Isaan to dig a well. Might help you...maybe not....here it is:

"A couple of years ago we had a “pond”, actually almost 6 rai, dug in, 3 meter deep for 1 ½ rai and the remainder 2 meter. The first wet season filled it to capacity, but dry season had it loose approx half its volume. The dry windy days, one could almost stand and watch the level drop. All this time it was still above the surrounding water table level. This year we built the wall up half a meter to bring it into align with the way the surrounding hills drain into it. Last season it had almost overflowed. This wet season it is again filled to it’s new capacity, which is now well above the surrounding water table level and seems to be holding well. The contractor who did the work had assured us it may take several seasons for the bottom to fully seal. The soil was sandy / clay and gave way to a more solid clay as he got deeper. He kept digging test holes in the bottom as the “pond” grew and what he saw in the test hole determined the different depths. There are 2 other (smaller) ponds on the farm that are approx 10 years old and I am told they sealed up after 3 years. Probably we are lucky, with the soil around here being more conducive to building ponds. "

If you build it as described it will be a very impressive hole.

Apart from concreting our fish pond ,what can we do to hold the water in the very sandy soils of Northern Isaan?

Similar question for a medium sized ornamental pool (still about 5 x15 meter,but shallow (max 1.5 meter.) A pool plastic would be used in the USA in this case ,but I have not seen any in Thailand -am I missing something.

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Mobaan,maybe you can advise me, is bore water in nth isaan suitable for aquaculture (catfish ,tillapia etc) am looking at fish pond on land we have but think we would have to rely on bore for water supply some of the year.

A friend of mine just enlarged the size of his fish pond in Northwest Florida and he added a chemical of some sort whick sinks to the bottom and helps retains the water. Sorry, I do not remember what it is called, but if you email me I can forward it to him.

A friend of mine just enlarged the size of his fish pond in Northwest Florida and he added a chemical of some sort whick sinks to the bottom and helps retains the water.  Sorry, I do not remember what it is called, but if you email me I can forward it to him.

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Could that be Bentonite -which I think is a very finly ground sort of clay?

A friend of mine just enlarged the size of his fish pond in Northwest Florida and he added a chemical of some sort whick sinks to the bottom and helps retains the water.  Sorry, I do not remember what it is called, but if you email me I can forward it to him.

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Could that be Bentonite -which I think is a very finly ground sort of clay?

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Bentonite is a type of clay whether it is finely ground or not. It is used to seal ponds but I don't know the technique used. It seems unlikely that sprinkling it in a pond would help but I really don't know and have no experience with this. I'm really interested in finding out about how bentonite is used for pond sealing. If you find something out please let me know.

I got off my duff and went searching and found this:

http://www.cjnetworks.com/~sccdistrict/pondseal.htm

I think its a good reference....of course I do because it agrees with me!!!! It says that dumping bentonite from a boat is totally worthless!! Also it agrees with what I vaguely remember learning a long time ago about using bentonite to seal ponds.