Dam Trees

[DaRube]

No, this isn't a typo. I had the guy from Soil and Water Conservation out yesterday to look at the pond, and the thing that he said needed to be dealt with post haste.....was the trees growing out of the dam.

As he explained it, either the trees will live....and their roots will degrade the dam.....or the trees will die, the roots will rot, and water will get into the cavities....and that will damage the [censored]. Sounds like dammed if the do, or dammed if they don't to me.

Anyway, I've got to get them out before it gets worse, and I've got two options......either to use the tractor to pull them out, or to chainsaw them down. Most of them are one or two inches in diameter, but a few get as much as four inches in diameter. Any recommendations?

 

[CSAW]

What if you just make the trees sick? /w3tcompact/icons/grin.gif

 

[njrqs]

I had always wondered about trees and dams.

I have a dam with a few trees around it, but have planted heaps more.

How will the roots degrade the dam - Did he say?

Mine is for irrigation water and just for looking nice, so I think I'll stick with the trees unless I hear something REAL bad.

Let me know the details of what he said ??

Cheers

 

[StoneHeartFarm]

Neil

Is anyone or anything down stream of your dam should there be a problem? Or is it just some neighbors that you don't really need anyway?

SHF

 

[frank_f15]

i wonder if any of these state guys ever told a BEAVER how to build a pond or dam.if a task is difficult, the state or feds wil make it more so/w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif.u try to do someting good and they want to put a damper on it.TOO BAD THEY DID NOT PUT SOME RESTRICTIONS ON ENRON, DON'T U THINK? much worse than a tree growing where it should not be!

 

[Phred]

DaRube,

While I am hardly an expert.
It seems to me that the trees would actually help hold this dam thing togheter.
After all is that not the way you hold a hill side or other loose dirt togheter; with trees and other plants?

Fred

 

[njrqs]

Phred

That's what I was thinking. I can't see how they can hurt other than sucking some of the water out.


Stoneheart - Yep if mine falls over then no dramas. There is avacant lot behind but I don't think they'll build right in line with my dam anyway.

Are you suggesting the trees will cause it to fail??

 

[PhilNH5]

DaRube,
I have a small but deep pond. Three feet on the other side of the dam was a beautiful beech tree. The prior owner left it there when he dug the pond. Couldn't bear to cut it down. It was more than half dead when I acquired the place. Now it is all dead. And my pond leaks at 4 feet below the waterline.

My first thought was exactly what you were told. That the decayed roots act as a conduit for the water. After doing a little research I read that this is a common problem. I now make sure now to keep all the trees away from the dam. It is a constant battle as the birch trees pop up like weeds. After the initial clearing whitch my trusty Poulan chainsaw (before my 025C) I now use the brushcutter blade on my weedtrimmer to keep things under control.

I still don't know how to fix the existing leaks. Can't find any one to sell me some clay.

Phil

Phil

 

[DaRube]

At first, my impression was that tree roots would hold things together, too. So I was a little surprised when he mentioned this. I had some guys out later that day taking down a big tree. They were some pretty experienced country guys who had even done landscaping work in the past. They were not surprised at the recommendation to remove the trees. Of course, they would have been happy to do the work for me also, for a pretty penny.

As to the G-Man, he was a very low-key type....didn't have one of those attitudes of self importance that can be spotted a mile away. And he gave me some ideas on other parts of the property that are cheaper solutions than I would have come up with. So I have no reason not to think that he is earnest about this.

Thanks for all the good insights.

 

[shade2u2]

I will trade you my clay for shale or topsoil. /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif/w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif
I have more clay than I want. It made it difficult for me to get a septic permit. /w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif
I have to haul in shale to build my driveway bed. /w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif

 

[StoneHeartFarm]

<font color=blue>i wonder if any of the state guys ever told a BEAVER how to build a pond or dam</font color=blue>

Yup! /w3tcompact/icons/grin.gif They sure did. And they whacked the landowner with a big fine for the stream being dammed, too.

Its on the Snopes website, here's the link. <A target="_blank" HREF=http://snopes2.com/humor/letters/dammed/htm>http://snopes2.com/humor/letters/dammed/htm</A>

SHF

 

[StoneHeartFarm]

neil

Naw, I just thought maybe you could get rid of your neighbors. /w3tcompact/icons/eyes.gif/w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

SHF

 

[rmorgan]

Trees don't really hold hills together too well, although surface plants like crown vetch or grass do. Think how many times you've seen a hill slide away, toppling trees with them: Our woods are full of 'em.

Trees will sometimes degrade hillsides the same way they can degrade dams. First, the roots can grow through on the water side and facilitate migration of water along the root/clay boundary into the dam through simple hydraulic pressure. If those roots also grow out to the outside of the dam, the water's got a potential straight path to a new level. Second and potentially worse, when a tree or just a root dies, it decomposes and can eventually leave a tunnel for water to go through. And if the dam ever needs work, there is no way to be sure that all the roots have been removed to ensure a good seal afterwards. We had a very experienced pond builder out a couple of years ago with a request to rework a dam with a lot of middle-aged trees on it, and he simply refused (which turned out to be good salesmanship on his part; we love our new pond /w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif).

Whether or not cut down all your trees is another question, unless theree signs of trouble: Just be aware of the risks. Some trees shoot their roots straight out to water as quick as they can; others are much more polite about it. Our old dam was probably 80-90 years old and still holding water, although at least in part this was because it was silted in so much that the water was only about 2' deep at the dam edge. If you do take out the trees, I wouldn't worry too much about removing the root balls unless there are some that clearly have grown into the pond, and those can be cut out and sealed with either clay or Bentonite.

 

[njrqs]

It would take more than a dam burst to get rid of my close neighbours. They have a lot of crap !!

Cheers

PS - Now not sure what to so about my trees. I think the look of them will outweight the bad bits, and maybe by the time they cause problems, I'll be long goind from here !

Cheers

 

[StoneHeartFarm]

Hmmm /w3tcompact/icons/hmm.gif if they're that hard to git rid of, you might have to make the dam bigger. /w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif

SHF