Check Dams

I traveled up the mountain to my Tanasi land… a bit of the mountain I call my own. Tanasi is my great great grandmother’s name. Somewhere in my brain, I had it that “tana” means weaver and “si” is a diminutive. So I thought her name meant Little Weaver. Going through my Choctaw dictionary, I can’t find it… so I must have dreamed it! Tanasi is also where Tennessee comes from…

Tanasi is a place I hope to play around with… and I have a plan… today I did a little bit.

When Vernon replaced the fence last year, he piled the old fence posts along the way. I’ve had ideas for utilizing check dams and leaky weirs. These two ideas have been used for years in the southwest and Australia and around the world. These are used to slow runoff water down. Since there is no runoff water this year… as yet… they may be more valuable ideas than ever before.

Check dams are small, and the point is not to STOP water, but simply to slow it down. Often described as only one or two rocks high, I built a few today.

I made some with the old fence posts. Are they permanent? No. Could cows and elk mess them up or high water wash them away? Sure, but if a rainstorm comes through, all that needs to happen is the water slows down enough to soak into the ground. Soaking into the ground helps the surrounding plants, drops off silt, and rebuilds the aquifer.