What kind of dirt do you accept at dump sites?

Clean fill dirt, clay, topsoil, sand, and most uncontaminated excavation material. If you're unsure, your dispatcher will ask for a photo and confirm whether your material qualifies before you haul.

What if there's no dump site near my job?

We're actively expanding real dump site coverage across DFW and Denver metro. Check the live map at dumpsite.io/dfw or dumpsite.io/denver to see exactly what's open right now — if nothing's close enough yet, your dispatcher will find the best alternative and let you know before you commit.

What makes DumpSite different from other dump site options?

Two things nobody else offers: a real dispatcher who tailors the match to your project — material type, yardage, truck access, and location — instead of handing you a generic list, and a live public map (dumpsite.io/dfw and dumpsite.io/denver) showing exactly which sites are open right now. Use either path — text a dispatcher for a custom match, or check the map yourself.

How does the savings guarantee work?

If you don't save more on disposal costs than your membership fee in your first month, we refund your subscription in full AND give you the next month free. We track your loads, so the math is simple.

Can I cancel anytime?

Yes. Month-to-month, cancel anytime, no contracts, no cancellation fees. We keep you because the service works, not because of fine print.

I'm a driver, not a contractor. Do I have to pay?

No. Drivers never pay. Our driver network is completely free. If you're a driver looking for dump sites or paid hauling work, visit our driver page or just reach out — we'll get you set up at no cost.

How fast can you get trucks to my site?

Average dispatch time is under 1 hour. Members with priority access often see trucks within 30 minutes. Your dispatcher will give you a real ETA before you commit to anything.

Dirt by project type/What to Do With Excess Dirt From a Pond or Retention Basin Dig

What to Do With Excess Dirt From a Pond or Retention Basin Dig

Not all the dirt that comes out of a pond dig needs to leave the property — the clay-rich core often gets reused right there in the berm. What's left over, plus any wet muck from the bottom, is what actually needs a dispatcher match. Here's how to tell the difference and get it hauled without a wasted trip.

A pond dig and a foundation cut look like the same job from the excavator's seat — dig a hole, figure out what to do with what comes out of it. They're not the same job. Pond and retention basin excavation runs into two problems a basement or footing dig usually doesn't: the dirt tends to come out wetter than normal, and a real chunk of it might not be excess at all. Get either of those backwards and you either send a truck to a site that turns it away, or you pay to haul off material you were about to need for the berm.

Why Pond Digs Run Wetter Than a Typical Excavation

Ponds get dug where water already wants to be. A natural low spot, a seasonal wet area, a drainage path that's been soaking that patch of ground for years — that's exactly the terrain that makes sense for a pond in the first place, and it's exactly the terrain that produces wetter spoil once you start pulling dirt out of it. A footing dig on a dry building pad rarely deals with this. A pond dig, especially past the first few feet, often does.

Wet isn't automatically disqualifying. Dumpsite.io's accepted-materials guidance is clear on this: wet or muddy dirt is usually fine to dump as long as it's soil, not standing water. The problem isn't that a site can't handle moisture — it's that not every site can handle every load of it on a given day, and a truck that shows up unannounced with a visibly saturated load can get turned around. That's a wasted trip for you and a wasted slot for someone else. Flagging "wet" before the truck rolls is the entire fix.

If you're in DFW, this matters more than it might elsewhere — the Blackland Prairie belt and the clay-heavy Eagle Ford and Austin Chalk formations underneath a lot of the metro hold water and swell when they get it, so pond spoil pulled from clay ground can run wetter and heavier than the same volume of sandy soil. Denver has its own version of this: Denver Formation and Pierre Shale claystone are bentonitic and expansive, meaning they absorb water and change volume more than you'd expect. Neither of these is a reason to avoid pond digs. It's just a reason to describe the material accurately when you reach out.

Not All of That Spoil Is Waste — The Berm Question

Here's the part that actually changes the math on a pond job, and it's the one that trips people up: if the property owner is building a dam or berm as part of the pond, some of what comes out of that hole isn't leaving the property. It's going right back in, just a few feet over.

What usually goes back into the berm

The clay-rich core material pulled from the middle of the dig is often exactly what a berm or dam needs. Clay compacts well and holds a shape, which is the whole point of a berm — it's a barrier, not backfill. Contractors who are already set up to build the berm as part of the job routinely stockpile that core material on-site and work it directly into the embankment. That's not dirt waiting to be disposed of. That's material doing its job.

What's actually excess

What's left over falls into two buckets. First, organic muck pulled from the bottom of a natural low spot — topsoil, root mat, decomposed vegetation mixed into the soil — which isn't berm material and generally isn't something you want compacted into an embankment anyway. Second, simply more spoil than the berm needs. Even a well-planned dam doesn't use every yard that comes out of the basin; the excess has to go somewhere, and "somewhere" is where dumpsite.io comes in.

Why This Distinction Matters When You Call a Dispatcher

If you call a dispatcher and describe the whole dig total, you're going to get matched, staged, and scheduled for more truckloads than the job actually needs to move off the property. Call about the excess portion specifically — the muck plus whatever surplus the berm doesn't use — and the yardage estimate, the site match, and the number of trucks you book all come out right the first time. It also means your dispatcher isn't trying to place clay that was never going to leave your property in the first place.

This is worth sorting out before you even pick up the phone. Walk the pile — or better, walk it with whoever's building the berm — and get a rough split: this much is going into the embankment, this much has nowhere to go but off-site. That second number is the one you're texting in.

Backyard Pond vs. Farm-Scale Retention Basin: The Math Changes a Lot

Scale is where pond and retention basin projects diverge hardest. A decorative backyard pond and a ranch stock pond or farm retention basin are the same category of job on paper and wildly different jobs in practice.

A small, shallow backyard pond can land in the 20 to 50 cubic yard range, which lines up with what most homeowners picture when they hear "pond." But even a modest rectangular pond scales up fast. Take a 20-by-30-foot backyard pond dug 4 to 6 feet deep: 20 x 30 x 4 / 27 works out to about 89 cubic yards, and at 6 feet deep that's 20 x 30 x 6 / 27, or roughly 133 cubic yards. That's before you subtract anything reused for a berm — it's just what came out of the ground.

Now go to farm scale. A half-acre retention basin (21,780 square feet) averaging 6 feet deep works out to 21,780 x 6 / 27, or about 4,840 cubic yards. That's not a weekend project's worth of dirt — that's grading-a-subdivision volume, and it's a completely different logistics problem than a backyard pond, even before you subtract berm material.

The membership tiers exist for exactly this spread. A backyard pond in the 20 to 133 cubic yard range fits comfortably under Pickup ($99/month, up to 50 yards) or Tandem ($299/month, up to 300 yards, with priority site access) depending on size. A half-acre basin pushing 4,840 cubic yards of excess is going to blow past even Tandem in a single push, which is where Fleet ($599/month, unlimited yards, guaranteed availability) actually earns its keep. And regardless of which tier you're on, the first load is free at any approved site, and the driver hauling it never pays anything to dump.

Getting the Excess Matched to a Site

Once you know what's actually leaving the property, the process is the same one dumpsite.io runs for any excavation job — it just needs the moisture flag added in. Run the excess yardage through the calculator at dumpsite.io/calculator using the box-geometry formula (Length x Width x Depth / 27), then text a dispatcher at (214) 753-8096 with the material type, that yardage number, the moisture condition, and a photo of the pile. If any part of it is bottom-of-pond muck or came out visibly saturated, say so up front — that's the detail that gets you routed to a site equipped to take it instead of one that'll send the truck back.

From there, your dispatcher matches you to an approved site, or you can pull up the live map at dumpsite.io/dfw or dumpsite.io/denver to see what's open right now — dumpsite.io also covers Waco, Tyler, Colorado Springs, Fort Collins, and Greeley if your job's outside the two main metros. Haul it, dump it, and confirm completion with your dispatcher so the match closes out clean.

Here's the honest summary: a pond dig isn't harder to deal with than a foundation cut, it's just a different kind of dig, with wetter material and a real shot at reusing some of it on-site. Sort the berm material from the true excess before you call, flag moisture honestly, and the rest of the process runs exactly like any other dirt job.

Common questions

Is wet dirt from a pond dig automatically rejected at dump sites?

No. Wet or muddy dirt is usually fine to dump as long as it's soil and not standing water — the key is telling your dispatcher it's wet before the truck shows up, since that determines which approved site you get matched to. Sites that aren't set up for higher-moisture loads on a given day may turn a surprise wet load away.

Do I need to go through dumpsite.io for the clay I'm reusing in my berm?

No — material that stays on your property and gets worked into a dam or berm never needs a dispatcher match. Dumpsite.io only comes into play for material that's actually leaving the site, which is why it's worth separating berm-bound clay from true excess before you estimate yardage.

How do I know how much of my pond dig actually needs to be hauled off?

Walk the spoil pile with whoever's building the berm and get a rough split between what's going into the embankment and what has nowhere else to go — organic muck from the bottom of the dig and any surplus the berm doesn't use. Only that second portion needs to go through the calculator and get matched to a site.

What membership tier makes sense for a large farm or ranch retention basin?

It depends on the excess volume, not the hole size. A half-acre basin at 6 feet deep can produce around 4,840 cubic yards of material — well past what Pickup (50 yards/month) or even Tandem (300 yards/month) covers in a single push, which is where Fleet's unlimited yards and guaranteed availability make sense. A backyard pond's excess, by contrast, usually fits comfortably under Pickup or Tandem depending on size.

Ready to get this matched?

Text your dispatcher the material and yardage — they'll take it from here.

Text (214) 753-8096 →

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