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Additional information on this topic provided below. |
Crooked Creek — The Stream With Large Bends
By
Kelly Meinhart
he Crooked Creek Watershed is an expansive area of land and
water stretching through both Indiana and Armstrong Counties
in Western Pennsylvania.
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scenic area played a large part in the history of Pennsylvania’s
development. The white man first settled the region back in
the days of the Revolutionary War. Financially unable to pay
the men who fought under General George Washington, the Continental
Congress instead offered them land for farming; it was called
Depreciation Land. Much of this Depreciation Land was located
in the Crooked Creek watershed area, and several tracts bordering
Crooked Creek are still held in that original status.
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only that, but mills throughout Western PA played an important
role in the development of America. Mills began to spring up
along the banks of Crooked Creek around the year of 1776, and
provided settlers with lumber, grain, black powder, and flour.
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it wasn’t the white man who first settled in this bountiful
countryside, it was of course the Native Americans, who named
the creek ‘Woak-hanne’ or ‘the stream with
large bends.’ But the stream with large bends that once
inspired its name has taken on a drastically different appearance
since the 1700’s. The Crooked Creek of today reflects
continued human advancement; that of the Crooked Creek Lake
dam.
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construction of the dam began in 1937, and was completed in
1951. It was built primarily for flood control and controls
a drainage area of 277 square miles. The actual basin of the
dam extends about 29 miles to the East, and is about 10 miles
wide. This dam has forever changed Crooked Creek.
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Crooked Creek of today continues to change, but under the watchful
eyes of the Crooked Creek Watershed Association (CrCWA). I recently
met up with Pam Meade and Dennis Hawley, both on the board of
CrCWA, for a personal tour of the watershed and some of their
projects.
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group has been together for about 23 years, and has some major
accomplishments to tout.
One of the biggest is the recent completion of a Rivers Conservation
Plan for the lower half of the watershed. This plan outlines
the entire area, what negative impacts it faces, and the natural
features to be protected. It’s a program funded by PA
DCNR, and it’s a very positive project for a watershed
association to complete. They are currently working on a plan
for the upper section of the watershed as well. We began our
tour of the watershed at the lower end, at Crooked Creek Lake.
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Crooked
Creek Lake Outflow |
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 ishing
is a major sport for area residents and visitors, and Crooked
Creek provides the recreational areas to take advantage of their
passion. Our first stop at the Crooked Creek Lake was the embayment,
or overflow area, where the CrCWA worked with the Army Corp
of Engineers to increase the aesthetic value of the public boat
launch and picnic area, located at the mouth of the overflow
spillway.
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lake itself provides valuable fish habitat, but just beyond
the walls of the overflow spillway was an area that needed some
help. When you look at the volume of water being released through
the spillway into Crooked Creek, it makes you wonder how anything
can survive the fluctuation of water levels and flow intensities.
Not only that but you can just imagine the affect that these
water levels might have on the banks of the creek.
 rior
to the involvement of CrCWA, the banks at the mouth of the spillway
had eroded away, and flushed downstream. It not only proved
to be a water quality issue, but a human safety issue as well.
Eroding banks made it dangerous for fishermen and for families
using the adjacent picnic area.
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watershed association worked together with the Army Corp of
Engineers to fix the problems. They began by placing large boulders
along the banks, filling it in with soil, and then planting
grasses and plants to provide structure and support for the
newly stabilized area. Along with the bank stabilization, they
also installed a handicapped accessible fishing pier for the
community.
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Falcon
Park Restoration Project |
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rom
there we were off to Falcon Park. This is quite a special little
place because it is the home of the annual fish fry event for
CrCWA. This past year marked its 18th year for the organization
with a turn-out of approximately 80 community and watershed
members, and of course, fishermen.
alcon
Park is not only the site of their annual event, but also that
of a major bank stabilization project. In 2003, the group successfully
restored the banks of Campbell Run, which flows through the
park. Campbell Run is a tributary of Crooked Creek, and provides
both recreation and valuable fish habitat. Unfortunately, over
7-8 feet of soil have been lost from Campbell Run’s banks
over the past 20 years, with more to be lost if action wasn’t
taken.
he
group worked together with the owners of the property, a local
community group called the Polish Falcons, and secured a Growing
Greener grant to restore the eroding areas. Construction and
stabilization was completed earlier in the summer, and late
summer a group of folks got together to plant trees and shrubs
to complete the restoration. Dave Beale, the Watershed Specialist
for Armstrong County worked with CrCWA to select the plants
to be used, and they chose things like Lowland Cranberry, Buttonbush,
and Dogwoods.
have a feeling there will be a special celebration at the 2004
Fish Fry to commemorate the project and the improved water quality
for Campbell Run.
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Keystone
Lake Overflow |
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we traveled to the upper reaches of the watershed, additional
projects seemed to dot the rural countryside. The number of
projects and amount of work done in this watershed is astounding,
and I must admit, that I feel we would have to feature them
for entire month to cover everything! But, to stay focused,
our next stop was Keystone Lake, which is the site of three
different projects for the watershed association. It, along
with the Crooked Creek Lake, are the two biggest projects for
the association.
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Keystone
Lake Boat Launch |
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 eystone
Lake was originally built to supply water for the Keystone Power
Plant, which is a coal burning plant, and one of many in the
watershed. The group has been working with local officials to
maintain the only public access boat launch on the lake by installing
a boat ramp and by restoring the eroding shoreline adjacent
to the parking lot. In addition to their work at the boat launch,
they also restored the streambanks at the mouth of the overflow
spillway – much like they did at Crooked Creek Lake. But
it doesn’t stop there for Keystone Lake. Abandoned Mine
Drainage (AMD) was also a factor in the water quality for the
lake. AMD was seeping from the hillside directly into Keystone
Lake. That is, until the CrCWA got involved and created a wetland
treatment system to filter out the metals before the drainage
reached the lake.
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Keystone Lake AMD Treatment
Area |
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 ur
last stop was Kavalcheck Bridge. Debris and high flows were
scouring out the hillside supporting the bridge, and debris
was constantly jamming up against the bridge after storm events.
Both of these problems spelled disaster for the bridge. Thankfully,
CrCWA got involved and removed the debris and secured the bank
– thus saving this historic old railroad bridge. I’ll
be telling you more about the railroad and the rail trail that
runs through the area in next week’s feature about the
Cowanshannock Creek Watershed.
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Restoring
Kavalchek Bridge |
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and Dennis are involved in both the Crooked Creek watershed
as well as the Cowanshannock Creek watershed. These watersheds
lie next to one another, and so our tour with Pam and Dennis
will continue next week with a look at the Cowanshannock Creek
watershed. I guess you could say that December is Crooked Creek/Cowanshannock
month for Watersheds.tv, in that not only are the two watersheds
being featured in our weekly columns, but that Pam Meade has
also been named our “Watershed Hero” for December.
So be sure to look for both the feature on Cowanshannock and
the Watershed Hero feature next week on Watersheds.tv.
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lease
refer to the following websites for additional information on
the Crooked Creek watershed. And a special thank you is extended
to John Derby, one of three Army Corp of Engineers Park Rangers
stationed at Crooked Creek Lake, in Armstrong County. John is
the source of our historical data mentioned at the beginning
of this feature.
 Crooked
Creek Watershed Association
Army
Corp of Engineers, Pittsburgh District
Crooked
Creek Lake
Armstrong
County Pennsylvania Genealogy Project
Indiana
County Pennsylvania Genealogy Project
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