Gravity Siphoning A Pond- Siphon Is Underground, Moving Water To Ground Surface?

First obtain the written permission from the ducks, (according to some cartoons they may become agitated.

The water will flow as long as the water level in the pond is above the the outlet point , any mm above that will require a pump.

USB has a very valid point. Just build the duck pond higher with the excavated soil so that you have achieved a positive grade downward to fruit trees. Using a buried siphon is just complicating things, plus the darn things always plug-up with leave clutter and other organic debris as well as deposited soil. As an alternative you could always use a garden hose siphon installed on the surface instead of a buried one.

Anyhoot, keep it KISS! Why go through all the effort of building and opertaingr a siphon system that will not work as intended nor is entirely controllable (water flow rate) without getting into more complexities? Let gravity do all of the work instead. All you have to do is build a small edge of pond surface spillway that is a few feet higher than your highest ground point that needs irrigation, which discharges into a surface swale so as to transport the water to where you need it. Make sure that the spillway is adjustable to vary the water flow, as you don't want to flood the tree roots too much resulting in dead trees. I would suggest using a piece of pressure treated lumber oriented edge-on and secured into place with a row of solid concrete blocks each side of the board. Make sure you line the upstream and downstream sides of the spillway and the swale with cobblestones to prevent erosion.

Provide at least a 1.0% grade (1 foot vertical drop for every 100 feet of horizontal run) on your drainage swale.

Good luck!

You can still dig down at the lowpoint,your ground level is the bottom of the pond so you will still have the slop and the depth you wont.Do your drainage first,then your liner,the ground at the bottom of pond leveled off,the over flow to feed the trees with water will come when you do the ground work first.Good luck.

If you drain it, won't it function pretty poorly as a duck pond?

Seechet welcome to CR4.

I have a hard time understanding your problem. If the water table is unconfined and just one foot below grade, it would seem to me that the roots of any tree will also be in the water table.It also seems to me if such conditions exist, you must be living on or near a marsh. Is watering necessary? There should even be springs near the lowest end of your property. If you have a well, measure the static water level (the level when the well has fully recovered and is not being pumped). That level may be the surface of your water table. If you have a well and it is obtaining water from a confined aquifer, the level in the well may be different than the unconfined surface well. Be sure you differentiate the two types of aquifers.

However, since you live there and the house hasn't sank, it may also mean that the water table is deeper than you think. Be prepared to install a hole much deeper than you want if you are using water table water to fill the pond (that is the normal situation for a pond). Try a test hole to see how deep you may have to dig. You may just be digging a large dry hole and rue not doing more research.

If you are using roof water, or some trucked water to fill a reservoir of water, then the question is why bury it at all and simply place a storage tank on the ground where it is most practical to fill and empty.

thanks everone for your response. I can see through the answers the ways in which I didn't fully place my question, but I think the general idea of it was to keep it simple. I don't live in a marsh, I'm putting in a duck pond. I'm going to replace the water in the duck pond with a hose, and i'm using the drainage to water fruit. I want to make it look pretty in a suburban size yard, and I've simply been watering orchards for a few years, so I know how pretty a gravity fed ditch irrigation system looks flowing. I am reluctant to build up walls for landscaping allure. But i suppose that the response given by "Landscape"- along with others, has reasoned me into digging minimally, and most importantly starting from the drainage, thank you for that "Landscape"- and I'll have to build a slight retaining wall with a simple culvert. Thank you all for the common idea of keeping it simple, it saved me from a bit of digging and a lot of wasted water- appreciate the comments

Hi mate,good luck with your pond and thanks,you will get there in the end without all of the hard work and bother.Have you drawn a plan and marked out your area,all the best.

If the left had side represents the water level in the duck pond and I cut the tube off (2A) (1 foot) on the other - what would happen?

What would happen when the duck pond water level dropped a foot?

What would happen when it rose again?

you'll need to install an anti-vortex drain cover per code After all, this is a swimming pond! LOL

My question concerns the source of water for the pond. Let's just assume groundwater is not available for the pond, so it is filled by runoff, a stream, or your garden hose. If you excavated a three foot deep pond and installed a drain at the bottom of the pond, the pond would drain completely. If you were to extend the drain in the pond to an inch above the discharge area elevation, all water entering the pond above this elevation would flow into the extended pond discharge and flow to the irrigation area. Pond level could be controlled using a gate on either end. Gates are available with an extended valve stem that can be opened from the top, say off a short dock. Using a gated outlet at the bottom of the pond would allow you to drain the pond for maintenance purposes. Clogging of the outlet at the bottom of the pond is another consideration. It will clog with silt and other debris, so an appropriate pond outlet structure should be used if located at the bottom of the pond.

Hope this helps.

I really appreciate all your comments and suggestion; how nice the modern age is. I will surely do it differently now than i was originally thinking, thank you everyone!