Kanawha State Forest’s stream restoration project involved removing a dam built 82 years ago by Civilian Conservation Corps workers. Kiosks with text and photos telling the story of the CCC’s work in the newly designated state forest have been installed at several sites along Davis Creek in the mile-long project area.
Madison Miller and Christian Beard walk their dog Saint across Davis Creek on a fallen log just upstream of the former Ellison Pond in Kanawha State Forest.
In the footprint of what was once Ellison Pond in Kanawha State Forest stream, the channel of Davis Creek makes a lazy 'S' curve where logs placed across the stream form a series of riffles.
The recently completed stream improvement project at Kanawha State Forest included the construction of two new ADA-accessible fishing piers, including this one near the site of former Ellison Pond.
A new ADA-accessible fishing pier is located just above a set of stone steps built more than 80 years ago by Civilian Conservation Corps workers to ease swimmers into a pool created by installing a dam across Davis Creek near the entrance to Kanawha State Forest.
The base of the dam built by Civilian Conservation Corps members more than 80 years ago has been repurposed to create a small waterfall that oxygenates a downstream pool in the recently completed project in Kanawha State Forest.
Kanawha State Forest’s stream restoration project involved removing a dam built 82 years ago by Civilian Conservation Corps workers. Kiosks with text and photos telling the story of the CCC’s work in the newly designated state forest have been installed at several sites along Davis Creek in the mile-long project area.
Madison Miller and Christian Beard walk their dog Saint across Davis Creek on a fallen log just upstream of the former Ellison Pond in Kanawha State Forest.
In the footprint of what was once Ellison Pond in Kanawha State Forest stream, the channel of Davis Creek makes a lazy 'S' curve where logs placed across the stream form a series of riffles.
The recently completed stream improvement project at Kanawha State Forest included the construction of two new ADA-accessible fishing piers, including this one near the site of former Ellison Pond.
A new ADA-accessible fishing pier is located just above a set of stone steps built more than 80 years ago by Civilian Conservation Corps workers to ease swimmers into a pool created by installing a dam across Davis Creek near the entrance to Kanawha State Forest.
The base of the dam built by Civilian Conservation Corps members more than 80 years ago has been repurposed to create a small waterfall that oxygenates a downstream pool in the recently completed project in Kanawha State Forest.
A stream restoration project that began with the breaching of the 80-year-old dam at Kanawha State Forest’s Ellison Pond in October 2021 has ended with the creation of a mile-long trout stream with permanent pools, riffles and channels, and stabilized banks.
Built between 1939 and 1940 by members of the Civilian Conservation Corps, the 100-foot-long, 10-foot-high concrete dam created a two-acre public swimming area equipped with a beach, diving platform, changing rooms and stone steps descending into the cooling waters of Davis Creek.
Later, the pond was stocked with trout and used exclusively for fishing. Its glassy surfaced waters and gently flowing spillway also drew picnickers and sightseers, making it one of the state forest’s most familiar features.
But beneath its calm, reflective surface, the pond was a silt trap, accumulating tons of sediment annually and requiring costly dredging every six or seven years. By the time the historic dam was notched to begin the draining process 18 months ago, most of the pond was only 10 to 24 inches deep, making it too shallow to maintain water at cold enough temperatures to support trout year-round.
With the most recent major silt removal project at the pond weighing in at more than $400,000 to complete, West Virginia State Parks and Department of Environmental Protection personnel began considering other options. They came up with a plan to use a track-mounted grinding machine to gradually lower the height of the dam, allowing the 30,000 cubic feet of sediment trapped behind the structure to dry out and be hauled away. As the draining of the pond neared completion, its small resident fish population was netted and relocated.
Chapmanville-based Appalachian Stream Restoration and Reclamation Specialists was awarded the contract to complete that work, as well as to create a stream channel through the 1,200-foot-long footprint of the former pond. Company personnel used excavators and other equipment to strategically place boulders and logs to create fish habitat and silt-dispersing structures in the new channel and in a 1-mile stretch of Davis Creek upstream of the former pond.
The stream structures created pools, some of them quite deep, as well riffles and channels, to provide feeding and sheltering areas for fish, and to provide cooler waters and higher oxygen levels favored by trout.
Streambank stabilization work and planting native grass, brush and trees at the former pond area also were part of the project, along with the installation of two ADA-accessible fishing piers at the lower end of the project.
The stream improvement and bank stabilization structures have already emerged unscathed from several floods, according to Clark Sanford, the forest’s acting superintendent.
In March, the Division of Natural Resources made an initial stocking of 400 pounds of trout at the pond and several upstream sites. Within Kanawha State Forest, Davis Creek and its tributaries are managed as Class Q streams, meaning that, from March 1 through May 31, fishing is restricted to anglers with disabilities and youth up to 14 years old.
To mitigate the loss of the dam, which was part of the Kanawha State Forest Historic District and listed on the National Register of Historic Places, several kiosks with signs have been installed describing construction work completed in the park by Civilian Conservation Corps members stationed at Camp Kanawha from 1938 to 1942.
In addition to the dam and swimming area, CCC crews built the forest’s picnic pavilions, footbridges, roads, electric lines and the superintendent’s residence. They also removed abandoned mine structures found within the forest’s boundaries when it was created in 1937.
The New Deal-era encampment was located just behind the forest’s new headquarters building, near the site of the former KSF swimming pool.
Money to cover the cost of the stream improvement project came from the Department of Environmental Protection’s In Lieu Fee Program, in which entities otherwise unable to mitigate for stream effects under the Clean Water Act are allowed to pay into the DEP’s In Lieu Fee Fund.
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