Since the 4” closely followed by the 5”-6” rainfall in Lehigh and Northampton Co’s, as well as that second storm covering most SE Pa counties, I have been intentionally biking roads along streams as much as possible observing the flows, damage, and new habitat features, covering around 225 mi since the storms.
The visibility and freedom to stop or creep along almost anywhere provided by biking has it advantages when looking over embankments, etc. Streams sure got a good physic. Substrate surfaces are quite clean (too clean) in a lot of stretches, indicating that tremendous scouring occurred. A substantial, temporary loss of macroinvertebrate biomass undoubtedly accompanied the scouring through flushing and crushing.
There are certainly a lot of new undercuts, expanded point bars causing new or additional bank erosion opposite the rubble/gravel bars, and runs where there were formerly riffles. Most impressive though are the numbers of previously felled trees and logs 12-18 inches in diameter that were apparently picked up and transported along and across the flood plains by the very rare, high flows to positions where they then resettled across the streams with water now tumbling over and shooting under them. These trees have drilled some very nice new holes in formerly shallow stream bottoms, creating some great habitat for moderate to larger size trout in streams that were undoubtedly dominated by small trout due to habitat constraints. During the time of the flooding, these small streams became the sizes of typical medium to large warmwater streams where permitted by flood plain width. Having spent much of my life on, in, or around water I am still impressed by its power.
The visibility and freedom to stop or creep along almost anywhere provided by biking has it advantages when looking over embankments, etc. Streams sure got a good physic. Substrate surfaces are quite clean (too clean) in a lot of stretches, indicating that tremendous scouring occurred. A substantial, temporary loss of macroinvertebrate biomass undoubtedly accompanied the scouring through flushing and crushing.
There are certainly a lot of new undercuts, expanded point bars causing new or additional bank erosion opposite the rubble/gravel bars, and runs where there were formerly riffles. Most impressive though are the numbers of previously felled trees and logs 12-18 inches in diameter that were apparently picked up and transported along and across the flood plains by the very rare, high flows to positions where they then resettled across the streams with water now tumbling over and shooting under them. These trees have drilled some very nice new holes in formerly shallow stream bottoms, creating some great habitat for moderate to larger size trout in streams that were undoubtedly dominated by small trout due to habitat constraints. During the time of the flooding, these small streams became the sizes of typical medium to large warmwater streams where permitted by flood plain width. Having spent much of my life on, in, or around water I am still impressed by its power.
