In summer and fall of 2015 there was a 18 inch deep pool about 40 ft long where I pump from our seasonal creek into our pond. When we had the flooding of late December 2015, the pool filled in with rocks, gravel and silt and was no more than 6 inches deep. I scraped out a deeper area with hand tools to set my pump intake, but it soon fills in with gravel even with a moderate rain.
I would like to create a more permanent pool. What do you think of this idea: I would like to create a "scour hole" downstream of a barrier. The stream bed is about seven feet wide and 24 to 30 inches deep in that area. I propose to deeply drive about five or six T-posts across the stream into the hard clay bottom above my dug out hole and fasten a 8 inch log behind the T posts and reinforce it with 18 inch high welded mesh with rocks piled against it and the log. Basically create a small waterfall that will keep my hand dug hole scoured out when the creek floods again. It has about 400 to 500 acres of watershed, and we average about 47 inches of rainfall annually. Would this likely work for a few years or would it just bend over and/or wash out the posts or banks?
I think I would also cable/chain each end of the timber and go backwards at an angle to an anchor point outside the creek. It would help keep the posts from tipping over.
John,
Just a thought...when I was growing up in central Indiana near the Flatrock river, there was a guy that dug a "pond" on the side of the river, out of the current but connected. It was, and still is 45 years later, just a deep cove on the side of the river. It never filled in as it was out of the current. Would something like that work for you?
It probably wouldn't work, but just make a mud hole. I don't have any digging equipment.
I think it will likely washout with a heavy rainfall but it might be worth trying, you will need to anchor it well as moving water has a lot of power. Large heavy boulders would anchor better than a log chained to t-posts driven into ground. Your description reminded of a foot bridge my dad once built out two utility poles and 2x6's that he log chained to 6ft t-posts driven into the ground, heavy rains took his 30 foot long bridge out one year and tore it to peices. Moving water can have a tremendous amount of power, his watershed was 110 acres.
John F I think I would try burying a length of plastic drain tile with the slits in it in the rocks and gravel. Keep the end plugged that is buried and keep the other end on shore. When you want water put your pump intake down the tile line. It should act as a large permanent strainer.
Here are a couple pictures of the creek. First one is after big flood last year when it already dropped about a foot. Second is while pumping water to pond in calmer times. It shows my hand dug sump. The area where the pump is shows in the first pic along the left side of the frame. The current conditions are comparable to the second pic.
Many, many years ago when I was a small child my older brothers wanted a fishing hole below a newly constructed low water bridge. They used bolders and smaller rocks down stream of the bridge to create a makeshift rock dam. They raised the water level enough, maybe about a foot, to be able to catch fish off the bridge (went from 2' deep to 3' deep).
The rocks and pool stayed there through my young adulthood as I took my small kids there to fish and catch critters.
Maybe instead of digging a hole, make something to hold back water.
Sacks of sackcrete stacked up????
Let me know when the EPA hauls you away and I will come visit you in prison.
John - your situation sounds a lot like mine except that I drag/scoop rocks from two long shallow holes and move them up/down the creek so that I can maintain a crossing for getting my little tractor across the creek for bush hogging. It is a constant battle and hard on my tractor and rear scoop. I end up spending several hours a year trying keep the creek crossable. Aside from spending money on a concrete low water bridge (which might only last a few years), my options seem to be hard labor and prayer. Once or twice a year the creek comes up from a trickle to 30 feet wide and 2 feet deep. That tends to wash out the equivalent of two pick up loads of rock and gravel. Water is relentless and it would laugh at T posts and logs at my little piece of heaven. I suspect my watershed is similar to yours.
If you decide to try an experiment...I would incorporate the sackcrete idea from snrub (along with the t posts, chains, boulders, logs and maybe on old car).
I feel for ya!
Quarter Acre we have numerous low water crossings across streams as you describe that we use for farm equipment crossings.
What holds best for us (we have some very heavy equipment) is large rocks in the bottom covered with 3 to 4" diameter crushed limestone.
We had one of these well established (well packed in) crossings that is covered in concrete. While I was away employees had a concrete project where they ordered too much concrete. So the excess they had dumped in this crossing and used a tractor front loader bucket to smooth it out by back dragging.
I was a little upset and told them that all the concrete would do is create a place where dirt would wash out around it and we would just have to fix the wash.
That was about ten years ago and the concrete looks fine. It worked perfectly. I think the key to success is that the crossing had had tractors and heavy grain buggys crossing it for several years prior. That had all the rock underneath well packed in. The crossing also had wide sloping sides where water could spread out with rock running up the slope where water is unlikely to wash out around the ends of the concrete. I did not think it would ever work. It did.
I wouldn't use t-post. They are just too thin to hold. You could use 2 3/8 pipe.
I would dig and put a 8" or 10" post on each side, then either stack a couple of telephone poles, or use a large tree truck. They have used pine trees at Beaver Bend in their trout stream and they held up very good to normal water levels. It could be done by hand, but I sure would prefer to use equipment.
Since I don't have equipment or $$$$$ to buy some, or experience to run rented equipment, there's not much I can do as far as a large project on the creek. Contractors, even small ones, won't do anything in the confines of a stream. Guess I will keep scraping a pump suction hole with a rake and hoe every time it fills in. It filled in about three times since the big flood. Maybe the next big flood will re-create the large natural pool that was once there. Thanks for all the suggestions.
Years ago, a guy by the name of Tim Matson wrote a book about what you are thinking of doing. He calls them "digger" ponds. His book
Earth Ponds is available though the Pond Boss store. It has some extremely good advice on building the "digger dams" that carve out the area below them.
One minor point is that it probably is a fine line in defining what constitutes blocking a stream. Should it become an issue, at least the dams described in the book are easy to remove. They are also made from local tree trunks, usually oak.
Good luck,
Ken
Searching on "stream" "scouring" "weir" gives some info.
Looks like with our long range weather forecast, there won't be any water to pump or ponds left to stock. I am about to give up on any chance of rainfall around here. They forecast it 4 or 5 days ahead, then take it out of the forecast a couple days later, week after week, month after month. The forecasters have us thinking we will become the next Atacama desert. Rant off.
Sorry to hear about the unfortunate weather. I hope you get rain.