I have a spring-fed, concrete pond approx. 18' x 18' that sits at the edge of some woods and was overhung by a large walnut tree until a storm brought that down.Normal procedures for cleaning a pond are to drain it to remove sediment that has built up over time. Since the spring can not be controlled, emptying the pond would be a very difficult task.
I typically resort to a rake and pool net, however, this will only get you so far. The rake could get the large debris and the net the very small floating debris. The muck and silt just run through the rake or out of the net.
Well this year things just got too far along to keep working with the same old cleaning procedures. The muck and silt built up to such a depth on the bottom that they could only be removed by extraordinary measures.
Hence this Instructable.
I needed something that was somewhere between a rake and a net so as usual I looked around at my salvaged bits of materials and came up with the following.
I had an old piece of perforated aluminum plate left over from an architectural sample of a building sunscreen. I cut the perforated sheet with a cut-off wheel in my angle grinder and folded the sheet to make a box or basket with a bottom approx. 16" x 16" and 3 upturned sides approx. 4" high.
It was very heavy gauge aluminum, so bending was a bit difficult.
If I had to do this again, I would go find a perforated steel of thinner gauge.
The bottom of my (cement) pond is flat, so I made the front edge of the dredge straight.
I suppose the front edge could be curved to suit curved ponds.
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