Anyone have a MESS like this?

[Steve_Miller]

To me, that just a flood plain for that river. Unless you can prevent the backlog of water downstream further, you will always have this reoccurring.

Steve

 

[jinman]

Do I see a levee in your future? I don't think you'll stop that flow with anything less.

 

[thcri]

We have a cabin on a farily large lake that has the Mississippi runing through it. In the springs when there is floods and if the wind is in the right direction it will fill our beach up with all kinds of junk. One year our neighbor had a large tree come in. Water went down, tree stayed. They tried dragging it out with a fairly large Steiger tractor and the tractor couldn't move the thing. The next year when the water came up again it lifted off and moved downstream.

murph

 

[dapper]

Steve,
You are absolutely correct. The field is in flood plain. It is at a bend in the river, and when river comes up... it comes in. simple as that. It has been planted for as long as I have lived on the place, (17yr) and I know that the previous owner farmed it for the 30yr they lived here. I will continue to keep it planted. If I did not I would have to mow it or it would return to trees and shrub in a few short years.
Jinman,
No levee in the future for me. Much to expensive to build and maintain for so small a field. If the field were larger or the crops more important, or it threatened some real property damage I would consider the levee. Best thing for me to do is just go on letting nature take its course, and do the cleanup afterwards as best I can.
Thcri,
The creek bank is lined with trees and mock honeysuckle probably 30 ft from stream edge inward. I need to keep this buffer to keep erosion down. We had a large sycamore come down across the creek, and it backed things up and made a huge dam in the creek for about one season. Next spring and when the water came up again, it washed MOST of the trash on down stream. Still have the uprooted stump in the creek but it is at least pointing in the right direction, and doesn't back up as bad as it was.
Steve is right, there isn't really any practical solution to this problem. Short of building a levee or widening creek there isn't a good answer. Another thought that I won't go into is the fact that there are some very strict laws about what I can and can not do to the stream. Regardless of where my property line is and what the creek is doing to my property.

 

[N80]

I don't have a field like that but I do have a creekbottom like that. And of course, your field is basically just a cleared out creek bottom. The creek bottom is about 150-200 yards from hillside to hillside. The creek itself is often bone dry in the summer and most of the year you can step or wade across it. I have a 10 acre pond that the creek feeds.

All that changes, in a hurry, with a big rain. The creek (and the lake) will literally rise 10-15 feet! I've measured it. The debris and trash that comes with it is extraordinary. Anything from whole dead trees to plastic coke bottles to coolers. There is currently a white door, in its frame, sitting halfway up the dam.

We had considered building a bridge so we could drive across the creek when it is its normal size. But no simple bridge would last this type of flooding. I have a deer stand of three telephone pole sections that has survived, I've seen it submerged before.

 

[dapper]

N80,
The pictures you see are of the CREEK. I have a small DITCH behind the barn, that cuts me off from the back half of my woods most of the year. It is to wet to cross with out making huge tracks, and wishing I hadn't but I have to cross it to mow.I have been puzzling a way to build a bridge accost and like yours it couldn't be just a simple culvert pipe, or simple bridge. NOOOOO!!!! It has to stand up to water that can be 4' deep and 25' to 30' in a few hours. Fortunately most of the year it is simply a 2'-3' wet annoyance that I have to put up!