PIERCE
LAND
CLEARING
Salado is limestone country along a spring fed creek, wrapped in ranchettes. Ponds here are worth building and they need a test pit before anyone quotes a number.
Not on its own, in most cases. Salado sits on the Balcones escarpment with shallow soil over limestone, which is beautiful country and demanding pond country.
Salado sits on the escarpment where limestone comes up under a thin cover of soil. In plenty of places here you are into rock within a foot or two, and that rock is fractured rather than solid. Cut a basin into it and the water finds the cracks.
It is the reason we dig a test pit before quoting instead of after. That hole tells us how much soil you actually have, whether there is a clay seam worth winning, and whether the rock under the basin is sound. An hour of machine time turns a guess into a number.
Most Salado properties have a low draw where soil has collected over a long time. If there is enough workable clay in it we win that clay, haul it to the basin, spread it in lifts and compact each one into a continuous seal. That is the affordable way to a natural looking pond on rock.
Where the property genuinely has no usable clay, a liner is the honest route. It costs more, it works, and it is a known figure. We would rather quote a liner and build a pond that holds than quote cheap and leave you with 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.
The first step costs nothing: photos, a rough size, your location. We come back same day with a range from the published list, and the site walk gets scheduled only if that range makes sense to you.
We walk the ground with you, find where water already collects, and dig a test pit. On Salado limestone that pit is the entire basis of the quote: soil depth, whether there is clay in a draw worth winning, and how sound the rock is.
We put the whole build on paper in machine days, dig, dam, and spillway, with rock or liner contingencies called out up front where you can see them. The number you sign is the number you pay.
Once the quote is signed we get you on the calendar, typically a few weeks out. The machines arrive together, stage near the site, and stay until the job is finished, no disappearing mid-build.
Count on two to five working days of iron time for a typical pond. Every build follows the same discipline: saved topsoil, a real core trench, a dam raised in compacted lifts, and slopes cut so they can be mowed, not just admired.
Last step: a slow lap around the pond together. You check the dam, the spillway cut, the slope finish, and the dressed topsoil against the quote. We load the machines only when you are satisfied.
Then you wait on weather. Clay has to be worked dry to compact into a proper seal, and on a capped basin that discipline decides whether you get a pond or 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 Salado the quote will address sealing, because the limestone will not do it for you. Where we can win clay from a draw on your own place that is the affordable route; otherwise a liner is the honest one. Both are priced in writing before work starts.
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.
The quote has two halves: what every build includes, and the site-specific items we flag before work starts.
One price, one finished pond: siting matched to the water the land actually sheds, staking, saved topsoil, core trench, a dam packed up in lifts, a proper spillway, slopes you can mow, and banks dressed to grass. Machine transport and the walkthrough are never extras.
What moves the number on a Salado job: whether the basin needs a clay cap or a liner, how much usable clay is on your property, how far a lowboy can get up the drive, how much cedar has to come out, and whether the spillway needs armouring on thin soil.
Real ponds, real day counts, photographed on site.
Shaping the basin, Liberty Hill
Banks graded to mow, Liberty Hill
Lampasas expansion workFull process, statewide services, and the build standard: our Texas pond construction page.
Salado is a small town wrapped in large acreage on both sides of I-35, and that is exactly the pond customer. These are places where the water is meant to be looked at as much as used: sited for the view, stocked for the grandchildren, and expected to still be full in a dry August. That raises the bar on depth and on doing the seal properly.
Ashe juniper takes anything not mown or grazed around Salado, and the draw where a pond wants to sit is always the thickest of it. We clear land as our main trade and build ponds with the same crew, so the cedar comes out and the basin gets cut on one mobilisation, one crew, one bill.
On the escarpment a phone quote is close to meaningless. The pit tells us soil depth, whether there is clay in the draw worth hauling, and how sound the rock is underneath. That single hour decides whether your pond is a straightforward seal, a liner job, or better placed fifty yards away.
Salado Creek is spring fed and this ground sheds a downpour fast. A pond here catches everything above it in a hurry, so the spillway gets cut to grade and armoured where thin soil would wash. That work is invisible once the water is in, and it is what decides whether the pond survives a wet decade.
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.
If you want water you can see into, that starts with the build rather than a chemical. Depth, a shelf, banks that do not slump and aeration do most of the work. On a ranchette pond it is worth the thought up front.
On a sealed pond the first dry stretch is the real test. A steady drop beyond normal evaporation is worth a call. Caught early it is a small repair; left a season it becomes draining and starting again.
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 still worth looking at.
Most clients add at least one of these. Planned during the build, they cost less and land better than bolting them on a year later.
Bare banks wash, and thin soil over rock washes fastest. We seed and mat the disturbed ground with a mix suited to Central Texas so the first storm does not undo the shaping.
Moving water stays cleaner, and on a pond you are meant to look at that is most of the point. An aerator or fountain keeps oxygen through the column and holds algae back.
A dock or a hardened bank turns a pond into somewhere you use. We shape and compact for one while the machines are still on site, which is far cheaper than bringing them back.
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.
It has been an absolute pleasure working with the Pierce Land Clearing family. Everyone is professional, caring and has a great attitude. Highly recommended! Thank you for the beautiful transformation!
Harley Jones, Google review
They did an excellent job and were highly effective and the price was an incredible value. I am so thankful for them and will use them for all of my forestry needs.
Red, Google review
I can not say enough about this great family owned and operated company. My call was answered on a Sunday morning and they moved their machine in the very next day and began work, the week of Christmas.
Chris Bartsch, Google review
Dirt crews talk in shorthand. These are the six terms that matter most on a pond build.
Saving the living top layer before the dig and dressing it back over the banks after, so grass takes the first season.
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.
The key cut through the dam footprint, taken down to sound rock and backfilled with compacted clay so water cannot track underneath. On the escarpment it is slower to dig and more important than anywhere else we work.
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.
We build ponds along the escarpment and out across Bell County. A few of the places we work close to Salado:
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 Salado 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 by itself, usually. The 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 quoting without digging first is guessing with your money.
Often, down in the low draws where soil has collected over centuries. Whether there is enough of it, and whether it is plastic enough to seal with, is exactly what we look for in the test pit. When there is, it is far cheaper than lining.
Around Salado, yes. Permanent water on a ranchette here changes what the place is worth and what lives on it, and it is the thing everybody walks down to look at. What makes it worth it is going in with a real number, which is why the pit comes before the quote.
Nearly always. Cedar fills every unmowed acre in this part of Bell County. Because clearing is our main trade, the juniper comes out and the basin gets cut on the same trip with one crew and 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, and Salado Creek itself is one to be careful around. We will tell you what applies before anything starts.
Deeper than the chart minimum if the rock allows. Six feet holds water, but in an August here six feet is warm and low. Eight or nine keeps a cold layer at the bottom. What is achievable depends on the limestone, and the pit tells us that before we promise a depth.
Yes, and in this country it is a common call, usually about a basin somebody else cut straight into rock. We drain it, find where it is losing, and either cap it properly or line it. Often that 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 limestone.