TJ, what’s underneath the soil to prevent the water from being absorbed? Is it clay? I will hope and pray you will get the rain to fill this basin for all the animals, but especially the horses.
There’s a lot of clay in the basin’s soils (some areas, more than others), and this is a pond area that has held water in the past. We also have talked about using bentonite as a sealer for the ponds. One thing we saw after the five ponds were dug out in 2009 and 2010 was that they didn’t hold water as well the year after they were dug out as they did this year – which was much more dry than the previous years. Needed to go through a season of sealing? I’m not sure, but I can’t explain why last year, which was dry but not THIS dry, all the ponds went dry, and this year, three ponds kept water right through the hot, dry weather when we were all biting our fingernails and praying for rain! 🙂
TJ, what’s underneath the soil to prevent the water from being absorbed? Is it clay? I will hope and pray you will get the rain to fill this basin for all the animals, but especially the horses.
There’s a lot of clay in the basin’s soils (some areas, more than others), and this is a pond area that has held water in the past. We also have talked about using bentonite as a sealer for the ponds. One thing we saw after the five ponds were dug out in 2009 and 2010 was that they didn’t hold water as well the year after they were dug out as they did this year – which was much more dry than the previous years. Needed to go through a season of sealing? I’m not sure, but I can’t explain why last year, which was dry but not THIS dry, all the ponds went dry, and this year, three ponds kept water right through the hot, dry weather when we were all biting our fingernails and praying for rain! 🙂