the (dam) reason I haven't been around

the boss wanted to make a swimming hole for his grandkids, so we built a dam. 7'6" in the center, 56' wide. I don't have any pics after the snap ties went in becuore the wall was poured. we poured last thursday. this is one of those things that makes me glad I do what I do and not concrete for a living.

it rained a whole bunch while we were figuring out how to form the wall up, as you can see.
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Dam nice grandpa.

Glad to hear you're finally getting some rain. I was talking to a guy from the Austin area whose well had gone dry and was trying to figure out how to get water for the house. That led to a discussion about how people in his neighborhood had signed away their water rights when they bought their houses- they can't even harvest rainwater off their own roof because of that. So your situation must be different- I'm sure somebody down stream would get REALLY torqued if their water supply dwindled while your water level rises in the dam.

from what I understand, the water table has been getting lower and lower the last 20 years around here. the ranch hand told me the other day that the guy we have a hay field with had to drill one of his down from 480 foot down to 800 foot. all our wells are at 1000', down into the first layer of the trinity aquifer.

I've only lived here a year, but from what I've seen, one good rain will fill that dam. when it's not raining, the creek runs maybe a gallon a minute. it runs into lake belton about 2 miles down from the end of the ranch, and apart from the park down there, no one'd miss it. I'm pretty sure Charly has all the mineral rights to the ranch, also.

it's supposed to rain again on thursday, so we'll see how well it holds water