Choosing Your Ground
Of all the decisions you’ll make in designing and building a top-of-the-line waterfowl impoundment, site selection is the one you cannot afford to get wrong. After all, a great design on a bad site will fail, but even a simple design on a great site can succeed. In the end, you can manage water and plants, but a bad location is there to stay.
A good location will work with you, making every step of construction and management easier and more effective, but the wrong spot will fight you with poor soils, unreliable water, and a frustrating absence of birds.
So your first step is to don two hats simultaneously: a real estate developer and a biologist, to answer a few fundamental questions:
- Does the land’s topography help you or hurt you?
- Where does the water come from, and is it a reliable source?
- Are the birds already flying over this area?
- Can you get equipment to the site to build and manage it effectively?
Find a site that gives you a confident “yes” to each of these questions, and you’re halfway to a successful project before you even break ground.
Reading the Topography: Let the Land Do the Work
Considering that you’re “building” a hole in the ground, it’s not surprising that your biggest construction expense will be moving dirt. Period. The more you have to fight gravity and reshape the existing landscape, the more expensive your project is going to be. The secret to an efficient and cost-effective design (and a simpler job of managing it) is to find a location where the land is already trying to do most of the work for you.
Start by looking for natural bowls, shallow valleys, or broad, flat depressions where water already wants to collect. But before you even put boots on the ground, use modern tools like public LIDAR data, online topographic maps, or Google Earth Pro to study the elevation. You’re hunting for a site that allows for a balanced cut and fill, and there’s no point in falling in love with a site that just won’t work.
Here’s a critical concept for your budget: A “balanced cut and fill” means the amount of soil you excavate (“the cut”) from the higher areas of your impoundment is roughly equal to the amount you need to build up your berms (“the fill”). When a site is balanced, you don’t have to pay to haul in thousands of tons of dirt or pay to haul it away. You can simply rearrange what’s already there, and that’s a win/win.
Speaking of berms, when you’re planning them, remember to account for freeboard. Don’t just build them to your planned maximum water level. You’ll need at least another one to two feet of height on top of that to handle wave action and prevent overtopping during heavy rains, which can trigger a real disaster. It’s a small detail that makes a huge difference in the safety and long-term reliability of your impoundment.
The Water Equation: Finding a Reliable Source
An impoundment without a reliable, legal, and affordable water source is just a dry hole. You need to have a bulletproof plan for securing your water source before you finalize your site, and absolutely before you sink that first shovel. There’s rarely a perfect answer, but you usually have three primary sources to consider. Buckle up - this can be a complex, frustrating task.
Groundwater (Wells)
Groundwater is historically the most reliable option, allowing you on-demand access so you can flood your impoundment precisely when you choose.
The Downside
The costs and risks can be substantial. Drilling a high-capacity well is a significant capital expense, and the ongoing energy costs to run the pump are an ongoing operational expense. Furthermore, in today’s climate, even wells are not a guaranteed solution. Groundwater depletion is a growing crisis in many regions, so even if you can get a permit, you may face strict limits on your pumping volume. As aquifers are overdrawn, water quality can also deteriorate, leading to higher salinity or mineral content. You must investigate not just the cost of a well, but the long-term health and legal status of the aquifer you plan to tap.
Surface Water (Streams, Rivers, Canals)
Pumping from a nearby water body might be an option, especially if the source is consistently available and it’s possible to get a permit.
The Downside
The legal hurdles for tapping natural streams and rivers are immense. In nearly every state, it is not possible to simply drop a pump into a stream without a permit, and those water rights can be incredibly complex, expensive, or impossible to obtain. You must also consider the risk of introducing unwanted guests into your impoundment from upstream, such as invasive fish (like carp) and nuisance plant species.
Watershed Runoff (Rainfall Collection)
This approach leverages the natural topography to collect rainwater from the surrounding land, which might seem like the most straightforward method. But, naturally, there are caveats for this, too.
The Downside
This is by far the least reliable method, making you entirely dependent on timely rainfall. And crucially, don’t assume the “free” water is legally yours. In many states, particularly in the arid West, the “right of capture” for rainwater is highly restricted. Under some water law doctrines, such as prior appropriation, surface runoff is legally allocated to downstream users. Capturing it without the proper water rights can be illegal. Verify your local and state water laws before banking on this method.
Don’t Forget to Do the Math
While you’re investigating potential water source(s), you need to know your target volume. The standard unit is the acre-foot (one acre of water, one foot deep). A 20-acre impoundment flooded to an average depth of one foot requires 20 acre-feet of water. But you also have to factor in losses from evaporation and seepage. Seepage can be virtually eliminated with a good, impermeable liner, but evaporation is inevitable. A good rule of thumb is to plan on needing 1.5 to 2 times your target volume throughout the season to maintain it properly.
Hunting Where the Ducks Are: The Local Flyway
You can build the world’s finest hotel, but if it’s not located near an interstate highway where plenty of people pass by, it’s going to have a very low occupancy rate. For waterfowl, the major continental flyways are the interstates, but waterfowl also use local corridors—river systems, creek bottoms, and valley corridors—as their secondary roads. Siting your impoundment directly under or adjacent to one of these local flight paths is essential to bring in guests.
Time to Get Your Feet Wet
There’s no substitute for direct observation. Spend time on potential sites at dawn and dusk during the fall migration. Where are birds currently going? Watch how they travel between feeding and roosting areas.
Talk to the Locals
Your most valuable intel might come from the neighboring farmer or the local wildlife biologist. They have decades of on-the-ground knowledge about where migrating birds traditionally congregate or feed nearby.
Use the Data
Modern tools, like eBird from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, can provide a wealth of data on migration hotspots and species density in your specific area.
“Build it and They Will Come” rarely works for ducks, so don’t try to create a whole new destination out of the blue. Your key to success is to put your impoundment squarely in the existing path of traffic.
Don’t Forget the Access: Infrastructure and Buildability
You’ve worked hard so far, but the most perfect, remote duck hole is worthless if you can’t get to it. Access is a simple, logistical factor, but it deserves its own focus.
Construction
You’ll need a solid, all-weather road capable of handling heavy equipment—excavators, bulldozers, and large trucks delivering liner panels and concrete water control structures. A muddy farm path that’s impassable after a rainstorm is a recipe for expensive delays.
For Long-Term Management
Your need for access doesn’t end when construction is over. You’ll need to bring in tractors and other equipment for seasonal planting and maintenance. Hunters, birdwatchers, and other guests will also need reliable access to the site. Ideally, this road will blend into the environment, yet be built to last.
If a good road doesn’t already exist, the cost of building one must be factored into your total project budget. Keep in mind, a “free” piece of land that requires a $50,000 road isn’t free.
