PIERCE
LAND
CLEARING
Young County is big ranch country with two lakes in it and a lot of ground that sees neither. We build the tanks that make the back pastures usable, priced off a published list.
Graham sits on the Brazos with Cross Timbers country around it: sandy loam and red clay over sandstone, mesquite across the open ground, and hardwood down in the river breaks. Lake Graham and Possum Kingdom are close by and belong to somebody else. What runs your cattle is the water on your own place.
Young County soils swing from red clay that holds beautifully to sandy loam that will not. A basin cut into the wrong stretch seeps away and never fills, and there are enough half-full tanks in this county to prove it.
What we bring is having dug this country and knowing what it does, so you get a real range on the phone rather than a form and a wait. What nobody can do is see through the ground from a call, and some tanks only reveal themselves once the basin is open.
Where a basin needs help the answers are a compacted clay core, bentonite worked in, or a liner where sand genuinely wins. Each is priced the moment we can honestly price it, and it never appears quietly at the end of the job.
Young County tracts are large and cut with draws that already carry runoff toward the Brazos. That gives us room to put a tank where the water actually goes rather than where it is convenient, which is most of the difference between a tank that fills and one that waits.
Depth finishes the job. Twenty nine inches a year with hot summers means a shallow tank goes warm and weedy fast, so our pricing starts at six feet at center and we push for eight or more where the budget reaches. The tool on this page shows what that costs.
A Young County tank runs in a set order, and the first number reaches you on the phone.
It starts with photos of the site and a rough idea of size. We answer with a same-day ballpark off the published price list, and if the number works for you, we schedule the site walk. No sales funnel, just a conversation.
Your first number comes over the phone, from having dug in this country rather than from a form. Photos and a pin usually get you a real range the same day. Once you approve the estimate we come walk it, reading the draws, the catchment feeding the spot, herd access, spillway routing, and what mesquite has to go ahead of the machines. On tracts this size the walk often moves the tank, and anything that changes the number gets said then.
The quote reads like a plan, not a mystery: dig, dam, spillway, and any contingency for rock, each priced in machine days. If clearing is needed first, it is on the same sheet at our published day rates. What is written is what you pay.
Within a few weeks of signing, the lowboy delivers the iron. All we need from you is gate access wide enough for the machines and somewhere to drop the trailer. Everything else is on us.
Most ponds take two to five working days. The sequence never changes: strip and save the topsoil, cut the core trench, raise the dam in thin compacted lifts, shape the basin. Watch as much of it as you like from outside the swing radius.
The build ends with a walkthrough, not an invoice. Dam, spillway, slopes, and dressed banks, checked against the quote with you standing there. Anything off gets fixed before the lowboy is loaded.
A tank sited on a real draw fills over a wet stretch rather than a season, because this country sheds runoff into those draws readily. We will not name a date. What we control is the catchment, so we size the watershed feeding your basin rather than hoping rain lands in the bowl.
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 6 feet of depth at center with a 4:1 bank. In Young County the variable is sealing on the sandier stretches, priced as its own written line the moment we know. Red clay sites usually run the list clean. Mesquite clearing rides on the same quote at published day rates.
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.
Every quote we write splits the same honest way. Here is what is inside the number and what gets flagged separately.
Every quote covers the complete pond: watershed-matched siting, staking, saved topsoil, a true core trench, a dam raised in compacted lifts, a shaped spillway, mowable slope finishes, and banks dressed with the topsoil we saved. Transport of the machines is included, as is the final walkthrough.
Sealing is the Young County variable and it depends which stretch you are on. Red clay usually runs the published list clean. Sandier ground may need the basin cored or bentonite worked in, priced as its own written line the moment we know. Mesquite clearing rides on the same quote at published day rates.
Real ponds, real day counts, photographed on site.
Pond basin at dusk, Whitney
Stock tank holding water, Marion
Dam graded on limestone ground, LampasasFull process, statewide services, and the build standard: our Texas pond construction page.
Lake Graham and Possum Kingdom are somebody else’s reservoirs on somebody else’s schedule. They do nothing for a back pasture three miles from the shoreline. A tank on your own ground is the water that decides what your place can actually run.
On tracts this size the siting decision is worth more than anything else we do. The draws through this country have carried runoff toward the Brazos forever, and a tank on a real catchment fills from ordinary rain while a convenient flat spot waits on a storm landing in it.
Mesquite has taken most of the open ground in Young County and the draws are usually the thickest of it. Clearing is often the larger half of the job out here. We do both halves, one mobilization, one bill.
This county has a lot of old tanks silted in or leaking behind dams that were pushed up rather than keyed in. Cleaning out and rebuilding is frequently cheaper than digging new, and we will tell you when that is the honest answer even though it is the smaller job.
On big Young County tracts the back country is only as usable as its water. A tank that holds is what turns distant acreage into ground you can run stock on instead of ground you own on paper.
Two reservoirs in the county and neither one waters your cattle. A tank on your own place answers to you, and in a dry year that is the only water you can count on.
Water concentrates wildlife hard in Cross Timbers country. Sited well a tank supports a wildlife management valuation and keeps deer and turkey on your ground rather than the neighbor with the only water.
Young County buyers look at water and fences before they look at anything else. A deep tank holding clean water in September says more about a place than any improvement on it.
A pond is dirt work first, but it does not have to end there. One call covers everything from grass on the dam to fish in the water.
Bare banks on sandy loam move the first time it storms, so we seed and stabilize what we disturb with a mix suited to grazing ground rather than a lawn.
Aeration keeps a tank cooler and cleaner through a hot Young County August and cuts the algae that turns good water green by July. Conduit roughed in while the basin is open costs a fraction of trenching later.
Hardened access points keep stock from breaking the bank down and silting in the tank you just paid for. Planned before the basin closes they cost very little.
Stocking waits until the tank is holding and the water has settled. We will tell you what actually does well here rather than what sounds good in a catalogue.
Pierce Land Clearing did an amazing job clearing our lot in Liberty Hill. It was wonderful working with them and I would highly recommend them for getting your job done right.
Devandar Reddy, Google review
Cleared lots of cedars for trails for us on our 14 acres. Cannot wait to have them come back with the machine for rock pulverizing on the rock trails.
Heather Wilson, Google review
Great job, turned a jungle into a park at a fair price, done just in time before the rain. Thanks.
Toan Do, Google review
The site walk comes with vocabulary. Here is what the crew means when they say it.
Clay you can roll into a ribbon in your hand. The soil that seals a pond, and the first thing we look for on the walk.
Texan for a working pond built to water cattle. Usually smaller, always practical, and built with the same dam discipline.
A keyway cut below grade under the dam and packed with clay, so water cannot travel beneath the structure.
The dam built up in thin layers, each packed tight by the machine before the next goes on. The opposite of a pushed up pile.
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.
A quarter acre tank starts at $12,300, a half acre at $19,200, and a full acre at $27,000, based on six feet of depth at center with a 4:1 bank. Minimum job is $8,000. Sealing on the sandier ground is the Young County variable and it is priced the moment we know.
Red clay stretches usually hold on their own and run the published list clean. Sandier ground needs the cut to reach clay or clay brought and keyed in. We know this county well enough to give you a straight expectation on the phone and the exact number the moment we have it.
Because the lakes belong to somebody else and they are nowhere near your back pasture. Water three miles away does not run cattle. A tank on your own ground decides what your place can actually carry.
Pricing starts at six feet at center and we recommend eight or more here. Twenty nine inches a year with hot summers means a shallow tank turns warm and weedy by July and can go to mud in a dry year.
Where the water already goes. On tracts this size we can usually find a draw with a real catchment rather than settling for a convenient flat spot, and that decision does more for whether the tank fills than anything else on the job.
Yes, and in Young County it is usually the first real work and often the bigger half. Mesquite has to come off the basin and dam footprint before a track hoe is any use. Same quote, published day rates.
Regularly, and it is often the better spend. We pull the silt, rebuild the dam with a proper key trench and compaction in lifts, and fix what was leaking. If a tank is not worth saving we will tell you.
Two to three days for a quarter acre and nine to ten for two acres. Rock adds days and we name that up front rather than after the fact.
Send photos or a pin on the draw you have in mind and we will come back with a range, usually the same day. If the ground turns out to need sealing you hear that number as soon as we have it rather than at the end.