Mike, when they were building 1-44 in the 1960's, they needed borrow pits for intersections, crossovers and the few valleys. As you drive along now, you see hundreds of ponds and small lakes along the highway. Most of them are concentrated around the features where the dirt was built up. But, there is one lake that is located along a seemingly flat stretch of highway. It is parallel to the roadbed, long and skinny, just like most of the others that you see. Because there are so many of these lakes before and after it, you might not raise an eyebrow as to why it is there. However, to the practiced eye, you cannot see any place where they used the dirt. Right after the highway was built, the small town located five miles from the farm was needing to build a sewage lagoon and associated roadways into it. The town was over a small hill away from the highway and happened to sit in a hollow that was filled with about 10 feet of topsoil. The contractor for the city came out and struck up a deal with the farmer that he would trade him top soil for the clay that he took out of the pit. The farmer took the deal but stipulated that he wanted the topsoil spread over his fields instead of refilling the borrow pit. The contractor liked that idea because he could haul soil both ways without having to stockpile the top soil for refilling the strip at the end. Once done, he just ran a dozer over the fields and the farmer was ready to plant. A fortunate turn of events was that there was a draught the year they traded dirt.... as a result, the contractor was able to dig the lake deeper than is normally possible, for a borrow pit. Although you would never know it by looking at it... it is almost 30 feet deep! My dad found out about the lake because he was doing bookkeeping for a tire company. The farmer contacted the tire company and wanted to get all of their tractor and larger tires. He was wanting them as breeding nests for Blue Catfish. You see, Blues only thrive if they have access to deep water. At that time, fingerlings were needed to restock the local lakes that had been over fished. The farmer wanted a second income stream! My dad helped broker the deal to deliver several trucks of tires to the farmer. In that deal was fishing rights, when the fish matured. (We could only keep males... but of course, you could catch anything that would bite.) I was about 12 when the fishing trips started. We would finish milking by 7PM or so, load up the pickup and beat it over the state line to fish. We returned home at sunup with a cooler full of catfish, just in time for the morning milking. After church, we would pack the fish in freezer bags and spend the afternoon dozing on the sofa.... while the baseball game was playing on the TV. I probably spent a dozen or so Sundays doing that, over the next couple of years.... I just wish our fishing rights had transferred when the farmer sold the farm. It was some of the best memories that I have of spending time with my dad.... and, we always had catfish in the freezer! I won't disclose the exact location of the lake but will tell you that every time I drive by it I long for the chance to experience just one of those fishing trips with my dad, again. To your point.... farm ponds are awesome. They all serve a purpose... even if it is just to get good topsoil for your fields and raise Blue Cats to sell!
@@alexosborne5629 here in the Midwest rural folks tend to trade as often as they can. Bartering is so much more enjoyable than buying and selling. We call it Horse Trading…. Sometimes the stories are worth far more than the goods or work that are exchanged!
Be very careful picking on Jerry boys, I've known several older equipment operators over the years, they tend to be ornery as all get out. Their upper body strength is nothing to trifle with, and don't try to out drink them, you will lose! They are also some of the best friends I've ever had...they are missed.
In the limited interaction we have been exposed to with Jerry, I have not detected much “orneriness” on his part, only professionalism, wisdom, and so much knowledge, he has forgotten more than we will ever know... hahaha... love it. Great video, Thank you sir.
That’s a very nice pond build , now that is going to a awesome swimming hole and blue Gill and bass pond. Or raise some supper big catfish . Nice and deep. Great pond. Love it.
I think your boys need to get them some camelbacks. It’s a water filled pack you have on your back that keeps the water cool to drink from a tube. We used them while deployed in the Middle East. The water was always with then
Pond turned out great looks awesome like to see when full and grass around .boy that Jerry a dozer boss what a great man I bet .the kind you can sit and listen to his wisdom.great video DP .👌😂✌️😎
Nice watching experienced operators run their equipment, it's amazing what fine detail you can get with a doser and excavator. My heavy equipment contractor sends me the same group of guys every time I do a job, there used to how I like things done and they're used to the type of work that I do so they know exactly what to do and how to read the site plan when they get on site and that makes the job go so much better. My guys try to get within a 1/4 inch of the site plan when they're all done it's amazing how close you can get to that mark with that big equipment. You might have had that little John Deere overloaded with that gigantic box blade on the back, I believe that exceeded manufacturer's guideline by just a hair. Bottom line is it's nice to have a good contractor like you guys that know what you're doing and are willing to take care of the customer.
thank, you for you're video. now that spring is almost here I've been planing all winter long on building a 5 acra pond on my 110 acra farm. I've got sady clay soil type. I've got the Equipment to dig the pond out here on the farm. this pond project to build is going to take me some time plus to stock it to. I've got a natural spring that's going to be feeding the water supply plus the rain water..
Yep, when my cousin built his 48x100 shop and house they run all the gutters from both to the pond, prior to those being built that pond would never stay much more than 1/2 full. After that they had to add a 12” overflow pipe because the 6” couldn’t keep up on heavy rains
Speaking of dangerous tractor operators, Mr. DP, from the camera angle, it looked like 30 degrees, definitely a no no in the tractor world but you pulled it off!!! Good job!!
Your suppose to use that bucket. Lol I used the bucket once and crept inch by inch almost 1/4 mile.. love your videos makes me miss operating God bless
As much as I enjoy seeing DP err, I will offer this in his defense. When going clock-wise across the back of the dam, the angle of the land plane blades to the left (downhill) and the weight of the dirt on the lower side of the implement, actually pulled DP off the edge. Don’t ask me how I know.
I purchased a Woods brand grader/planer for my tractor because it had the most weight in its class and I liked the way I could adjust the shoes rather than the blades to adjust the depth of cut. It is nice to see someone else who has one.
Little advice, don't run that roller parallel to a fill slope, you will hut a soft spot and end up on your side. It's best to hit the edge at a 45 degree angle till the roller just starts to tip over the edge then work your way along overlapping. It takes a long time but you get a tighter edge and an upright roller. I've witnessed 2 rollers roll down a slope.
Wish you guys were local I plan on building about a quarter to half acre pond in my woods here in Middle Ga. soon. Hope I can find some guys that know what they are doing. I've seen some ponds that didn't turn out too well. It's scary knowing I may spend thousands and end up with nothing but a mud hole that won't even hold water.
Nice job guys, home owners must be very happy! DP I’m surprised you don’t have a 5 gallon water cooler of ice and water for the boys on the truck. MBTS is going to turn into a prune 😂 I would love to have a camera on that dozer for Jerry and for me to talk through his strategy has he moves along, lots of skill there to share👍🇺🇸
I've just subscribed DP, after lots of good comments from the Captain and seeing you on Letsdig18. Looking forward to catching up on your videos. Cheers Michael (from Scotland)
Didn't need to lose those trees, simply reduce the slow within the steep edge. By the way, digging the hole and sealing it is only the beginning of creating a quality body of water.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts and video. Nice pond build there. I was thinking, if they run short of water at least they have a really nice and safe fire pit. Great seeing the comradery between you and the crew. Wishing you and your family the best.
We''re at 5600 ft. there's no drilling into aquifers. It's trapped water in the rock structure of the mountain. Available water is all over the map. We're at 340' and get 3 gpm. our neighbor is at 57- and getting a little over 1 gpm. yet 500' from us is a well that's 200' and getting 15 gpm. We figure our well holds around 400 gallons at the static level and it's sufficient for our daily needs. There's no capacity to irrigate and we're in a semi arid climate so it's prairie grass growing natural.
Smartest thing I saw you do D.P. was reconsider the positioning on that one tree you said "I think I can get behind that one", I was thinking good move. Nice job guys, It turned out great!
A small (cute) pond. I didn’t hear if it’ll be fishing pond with fish to eat all the Mosquitoes people are talking about. LOL. So enjoy how you guys pick on each other.great explanation of what purpose of the pond. Great job again.
Next time in a dam like this, consider running your overflow pipe from the very bottom of the dam, up the wall and over at the hight you want the dam to fill to. I did this on many of the dams I built on the farm, so that a lot of the silt/rubbish went out in the overflow. Nice job though. thanks for putting it up
Another fine job young man! I've seen a couple of the ponds you built here on youtube and I can say that you do good work. I appreciate the fact that you make a conscientious effort to do honest, high quality work. Nice to see there are contractors out there who will go the extra mile to make the customer happy.
@@DirtPerfect I worked 41 years in heavy highway, was a grade and pipe foreman for 25 yrs then a Proj Supt for the last 16 yrs. I have easily moved a million yards of dirt. I see you know how to work in wet areas, and how to economize that effort. You work like a fox, not like an ox !! Most of my work experience and projects were on DOT projects in NYS and on Fort Drum - so you always had somebody making sure you are building to spec and as per plan - if you plan the work, it's easy to work the plan! I'm retired and I miss it sometimes; never when I'm on the golf course! take care and keep up the good work!
I was wondering what was so special about the dirt in the UK that makes it worth bringing it so far but I’m not yet a graduate of Dirt Perfect’s Dirt Nerd Academy.
That's gonna be a deep Lil hole. Idk how much water is in it by now but looks like y'all may get a little bit of rain off hurricane Ida this week. It's supposed to center us here in NW Alabama. Great video! Enjoyed it!
i run a side siting sheep's foot and it was horrifying on that low side i just knew i was going to turn over untill i got some faith in the operator of the grader i was working with
Please consider a video on the types of earth and how to tell them apart. Laser make/model - I need to read the instructions to follow along better - tks FANTASTIC DAY - great to see all the simultaneous work/equipment/guys like ants in one smallish area. Great video!!!
I like the pond, I do think though its a bit steep for cows to water from as they love to drink water but swimming is not real high on the fun things to do for cows. Deep enough to support a trout of some kind but not lots of fish as they do tend to make water smell bad if not running. Great video... more hair on the tail than me as I rolled over on a tractor someone else drove and I got hurt.
