Mapping, contour and building a pond

Hi all,

My name is Manjunath, from Bangalore. Have been around for a bit, reading posts and getting hang of things. Well, needless to say, the reason I am on this forum is because I want to start farming. Have bought about 3.5 acres in TN, bordering Karnataka, around 80 kms from my place. Have got it fenced. Now, I want to do two things on priority … 1) do rain-water harvesting, including a catchment area in the form of a pond 2) prepare the land for planting some trees in trenches along the contours.

What I need to understand is how do I go about mapping the land to understand gradient and then find the ideal location for the pond/tank. Any help here would really make this process easier.

Thanks in advance!

Manjunath

[quote=padiki]
What I need to understand is how do I go about mapping the land to understand gradient and then find the ideal location for the pond/tank. Any help here would really make this process easier.[/quote]

Contour mapping has been discussed earlier on the forum. Hegde found a simple way to accomplish it using Google Sketchup.

youtube.com/watch?v=y4J9sWEZR6E

Thanks! I did check this post earlier … the problem I faced is that 1) this is not very accurate and 2) the process of translating this on to the actual location would be very tedious. The local guys are clueless … and I have never don’t this before … so while some theory is in place, don’t know how to go about, say using an A-frame. :frowning:

Has someone done similar stuff or planning to do … do let me know!

The last option would be to go there on a rainy day and check how the water flows ??? :smiley:

Hi all,

Thanks a lot for all the help, suggestions and very useful links.

I managed to build a water leveler with scale and use the same to start contouring my land. After the initial hicups, figured how to go about … so now the speed of mapping is going up with each contour! ;D

Now i have contoured a part of the land and will complete the remaining next weekend.

Now as the next step, I want to build a couple of ponds where i can direct the rain water run-offs from these contours. I need to know if someone has built a pond in their land as part of rain water harvesting or have some good insights into doing the same … and if so, any info, help, suggestion, advice would be of immense help!

Looking forward to all and any help!

Thanks in advance,

Manjunath


ANYBODY??? :frowning: Need to get this done this weekend … already missed some good rains! Help please!!!

Hi, if you have not already got the pond done, check out a post on the blog of anushafarms and try speaking to Shiv, since they got a farm pond built recently. I suspect it is not really a rain water harvesting pond though.

And do share your experience please. I would have to take up something like you in a while.

Hello

The pond which was built on our farm is housed to store the borewater that is not used during the rainy season. This was constructed by the govt.

The hope is that we can store enough water to smooth out the uncertanities in the year. Of course one has to depend on electricity being available to obtain that objective.

Good idea to go solar

Shiv

whats your observations visually?

share few info mate…