PIERCE
LAND
CLEARING
Driftwood is proper Hill Country: live oak, cedar, and limestone a few inches down. Ponds here are worth building and they are never a phone quote.
Only if it is built to. Driftwood sits on the Edwards Plateau with thin soil over fractured limestone, which is the hardest honest ground for a pond in this part of Texas.
Driftwood sits on the Edwards Plateau. In a lot of places you are through the soil and into limestone within a foot or two, and that limestone is fractured rather than solid. Cut a basin into it and the water finds the cracks.
That is the whole reason we dig a test pit before quoting instead of after. It tells us how much soil you actually have, whether there is a clay seam we can work with, and whether the rock under the basin is sound or shot through. An hour with a machine turns a guess into a number.
Most Driftwood properties have a low draw somewhere with soil that has collected in it over centuries. If there is enough workable clay in that draw we win it, haul it to the basin, spread it in lifts and compact each one into a continuous seal. That is the affordable way to get a natural looking pond on rock.
If the property genuinely has no usable clay, a liner is the honest route. It costs more and it works, and it is a known figure rather than an optimistic one. We would rather quote a liner and build a pond that holds than quote cheap and hand you a dry basin.
Most people have never had a pond built and do not know what the week looks like. Here is the whole thing, from the first call to the day it starts holding water.
Send photos of the spot, a rough size, and your town. You get a ballpark from the published list the same day, and if it sounds right we set a time to walk the property. No pressure loop, no form-and-wait.
We walk the ground with you, find where water already collects, and dig a test pit. Out here that pit is the entire quote: soil depth, whether there is clay in the draw worth winning, and how sound the rock beneath is.
A real number in machine days: what the dig costs, what the dam costs, what happens if we hit rock, and what the clearing adds if the site is brushed up. The price on paper is the price, and any rock contingency is spelled out instead of buried.
A lowboy shows up with the dozer and excavator, usually within a few weeks of a signed quote. We need a gate the iron fits through and a spot for the trailer, and we handle the rest.
Two to five working days for most ponds. Topsoil gets stripped and saved, the core trench gets cut, the dam goes up in compacted lifts, and the basin takes shape a bench at a time. You are welcome on site every day of it, at a safe distance from the swing radius.
Before the machines load, we walk the pond with you: dam, spillway, slopes, and the topsoil dressed back over the banks. If it does not match what was quoted, that is the moment we make it right.
Then you wait on weather. Clay has to be worked dry to compact into a proper seal, and on a capped basin that discipline is the difference between a pond and a slow leak.
Published, not hidden behind a form. Prices and build times are based on 6 feet of depth at center with a 4:1 bank.
| Pond Size | Starting Price at 6 ft depth, 4:1 bank | Build Time |
|---|---|---|
| 1/4 acre | from $12,300 | 2 to 3 days |
| 1/2 acre | from $19,200 | 3 to 4 days |
| 3/4 acre | from $23,300 | 4 to 5 days |
| 1 acre | from $27,000 | 5 to 6 days |
| 1 1/4 acre | from $30,400 | 6 to 7 days |
| 1 1/2 acre | from $33,800 | 7 to 8 days |
| 1 3/4 acre | from $36,800 | 8 to 9 days |
| 2 acre | from $39,500 | 9 to 10 days |
Prices are based on six feet of depth at centre with a 4:1 bank. Around Driftwood expect the quote to include sealing, because the limestone will not do it for you. Where we can win clay from a draw on your own property that is the affordable route; where we cannot, a liner is the honest one. Both are priced before a machine moves.
Size it, tell us what to do with the dirt, then draw the pond right on a photo of your land. Your estimate comes back by email, along with a preview of the finished water.
No surprise line items. Here is how the number breaks down on every quote we write.
Siting and design against your watershed, staking, topsoil stripped and saved, the core trench, the dam built in compacted lifts, the spillway cut and shaped, slopes finished to mow, and topsoil dressed back over the banks. Machine transport is in the quote, and so is the walkthrough before we leave.
What moves the number on a Driftwood job: whether the basin needs a clay cap or a liner, how much usable clay we can win on your own property, how far a lowboy can get up the drive, how much cedar has to come out, and whether the spillway needs armouring against bare rock.
Real ponds, real day counts, photographed on site.
Shaping the basin, Liberty Hill
Grading the dam, Lampasas
Lampasas expansion workFull process, statewide services, and the build standard: our Texas pond construction page.
Driftwood acreage is mostly people who came for the country and want to keep it looking like country. Ponds here are amenity water, sited for the view from the house and for the wildlife they bring in. Deer, turkey and everything else in this county are working out where the water is, and a pond changes what lives on your place within a season.
Ashe juniper owns anything that is not mown or grazed out here, and the draw where a pond wants to sit is always the thickest of it. Because clearing is our main trade, the cedar comes out and the basin gets cut on one mobilisation with one crew and one bill.
On the plateau a quote given over the phone is not worth much. The pit tells us the soil depth, whether there is clay in the draw worth winning, and how sound the rock underneath is. That single hour decides whether your pond is a straightforward seal, a liner job, or better placed fifty yards away.
On blackland a pond is a nice addition. Out here, in country where the creeks run only after rain, permanent water is a genuinely scarce thing. It is why the ponds we build in this part of Hays County tend to get built deeper than the chart minimum: the owners understand that in August, depth is the whole point.
A new pond looks raw. Bare banks, cloudy water, a season before it settles. Get grass established before the first big rain and it clears faster and stops feeding silt back into itself.
On a sealed pond the first dry stretch is the real test. A steady drop beyond normal evaporation is worth a phone call. Caught early it is usually a small repair. Left a season it becomes draining and starting again.
Permanent water is scarce on the plateau, so it gets found quickly. Deer, turkey, herons and everything else will be using it within weeks. If that is part of why you are building, leave a gentle bank on one side and keep some cover near the water.
You learn what a pond is worth in the third hot August. Six feet gets low, warm and green. Nine feet keeps a cold layer at the bottom and comes through it. Out here, that difference is the whole argument for going deeper.
The build does not have to stop when the water shows up. These come with the same one-crew, one-call approach as the pond itself.
Bare banks wash, and thin soil over rock washes fastest. We seed and mat the disturbed ground with a mix suited to the Hill Country so the first storm does not undo the shaping.
Moving water stays cleaner. An aerator or fountain keeps oxygen through the column and holds algae back through a long hot Driftwood summer.
A dock or a hardened bank turns a pond into somewhere you use rather than something you look at. We shape and compact for one while the machines are still on site.
Fish want structure and depth before stocking. We leave brush piles, a drop off and a shelf while the basin is open, so the pond is built to hold fish before you put any in.
Taylor knows his business and was very respectful of our property. His 3 days of service advanced our land clearing plan beyond our expectation. We will have him back yearly to keep our brush management in check.
Michael McCollum, Google review
These guys are fast and efficient. We used them on a project we thought was going to take them days and they got it done in a half day. We will definitely use them again, it was worth every penny.
Bryan Rogers, Google review
Amazing company! I had the pleasure of dealing with a family run and operated company and it really shows. They went above and beyond. I am beyond pleased with the way my land now looks. I had tried a smaller company prior to them and it was a giant mistake.
LD, Google review
Six terms you will hear on the site walk, and what they actually mean for your water.
The armored low route storm water takes around the dam instead of over it. The difference between a rain event and a rebuild.
Four feet of run for every foot of drop. Gentler banks are safer and easier to mow; steeper banks get more depth from less dirt.
The dry dam height above full pool, the safety margin that keeps a big storm inside the pond.
Every acre of ground that sheds rain toward your pond. It, not the hole, decides how fast you get water.
The water level at the bottom of the spillway, the highest the pond is designed to hold day to day.
Where the dam dirt comes from. On a well designed pond it is the basin itself, so every yard dug does double duty.
We build ponds across the western half of Hays County and the country around it. A few of the places we work close to Driftwood:
The chart starts at $12,300 for a quarter acre at six feet with a 4:1 bank and runs to $39,500 for two acres, with an $8,000 minimum. On Driftwood limestone you should budget for sealing on top. Whether that is clay won from your own draw or a liner is what the test pit decides.
Not on its own. The Edwards limestone here is fractured and will take water through it. Ponds in this country hold because they are sealed properly, either with a compacted clay cap or a liner. Anyone telling you otherwise has not dug on your property.
Often, in the low draws where soil has collected over a long time. Whether there is enough of it, and whether it is plastic enough to seal with, is exactly what we are looking for in the test pit. When there is, it is much cheaper than lining.
In this county, yes. Permanent water on the plateau is scarce, and it changes what your land is worth and what lives on it. The thing that makes it worth it is going in with a real number, which is why the pit comes before the quote.
Nearly always. Cedar takes over any unmowed ground in western Hays County and pond sites are always in the thick of it. Clearing is our main trade, so it happens on the same trip as the dig and on one bill.
On your own rural land, generally no, and agricultural water storage is exempt from most regulation in Texas. It changes if the pond dams a defined watercourse or sits on a recharge feature. We will tell you what applies to your site before anything starts.
Deeper than the chart minimum if you can. Six feet holds water, but on the plateau in a dry August six feet gets low and warm. Eight or nine keeps a cold layer at the bottom. Depth is limited by what the rock allows, and the pit tells us that before we promise anything.
Yes, and it is a common call in this country, usually about a pond somebody else dug into rock. We drain it, find where it is losing, and either cap the basin properly or line it. Often it costs less than the original build should have.
Tell us roughly how big you want the water and where you are thinking of putting it. We will walk the ground, dig a test pit, and tell you honestly what it will take on your particular piece of rock.