Documenting Permeability of Soils for an Animal Waste Storage Pond

Whether an animal waste storage pond has soils suitable for reducing waste leakage to levels required by State and Federal statutes can be determined by performing permeability tests. These permeability tests relate to undisturbed waste storage pond soil samples of either natural soils that exist after the pond has been excavated or soils that have been brought into the excavated pond and compacted as a liner.

To verify the permeability of a natural or compacted liner for a pond, the undisturbed soil samples must be obtained using a drive sampler after excavating the pond or compacting a clay liner.  Drive samplers are available on a short-term loan basis from the NRCS Soil Mechanics Laboratories in Fort Worth, Texas, and Lincoln, Nebraska to NRCS State offices considering a purchase of these devices.

Soil samples may then be shipped to either the NRCS Soil Mechanics Laboratory in Lincoln or Fort Worth for permeability testing.

Your contacts are Lee Ann Moore at 817-509-3322, Head, NRCS Fort Worth Soil Mechanics Center or lee.ann.moore@ftw.nrcs.usda.gov and Stephen Reinsch, Co-Director NRCS Lincoln, Nebraska Soil Mechanics Center at 402-437-5337 ext. 11, or steve.reinsch@nsmc.nrcs.usda.gov.