What features would your ideal training pond have?

If you were building a pond and wanted to keep retriever training in mind, what features would you include? Any specific depths or structural features? What about bank grades or other topography?

Some type of vegetation in parts of it

Some parts with a gradual descending bank for pups to get used to getting in water.

A part of it having banks that you could throw something across it like a U shape.

My 9 month old chocolate will not go near a pool but when I take her to the ranch she loves to romp around in the SHALLOW area of the tanks. She'll even stick her head totally underwater but I tried throwing a tennis ball out deeper...she ran toward it but as soon as it got up to her chest she stopped. I would take it somewhere with both shallow and deep and let the pup find a comfort zone and don't force the deep stuff on her. Not sure about the vegetation but if they get tangled...it will probably scare them.

This is my water. google earth, 33.523612,-97.136142. 11 ponds total. Works good for me.

Robby

I'm also thinking about adding sand to one bank when I expand the pond to make an entry point that isn't muddy to help with cleanup after training sessions. Just not sure if the sand will stay in place

this is a standard training pond I have built before. I also add a small island in the SE quadrant. if there are no cattle in the area, no sand is needed. a clay hard bottom will not ne too muddy. But sand added to the NW and SE banks will allow you full use year round taking into account thr prevailing winds (NW for fronts and SE for Summer)I added cattails after the 1st year. that was a mistake as they got out of hand very quickly. Due the drought in this area they died witch was a blessing. (the distance from the NW bank diagonally SE the SE bank is 101 yards) I almost always worked most of the year from the NW end. This has been a pretty easy to pond to build and maintain! please contact if you have any questions. JB

Bobby are you NW of Gainsville somewhere ? Could not locate by co-ords you gave.

water

Valley View, those are coordinates from Google maps.

Robby