Thank you for writing this, David. Coincidentally, Jason Anthony who writes Field Guide to
the Anthropocene, wrote about watersheds on the same day! I am curious about the map from Trotter and King. I am not able to read it clearly enough so I am not sure, but does the marked wetland in the center of section #29 say "Hubbard Spring"? Hubbard Homestead Park is near that location, named for my grandfather who farmed and lived there from early 1920s to when the property was sold in 1968. I grew up there as well and I remember that crystal-clear spring. My father had hoped that the City of Seattle would daylight the spring when they were constructing the park (after we sold the property, and before it became a city park, it was a Blue Streak park-and-ride-lot). The daylighting was not successful, but not for lack of trying on my father's part -- and thanks to the nice folks at Thornton Creek Alliance for helping him. He/they learned that the spring water had been buried and captured (as you describe) during construction of a building complex just to the north.
I have been kind of researching where the most likely year-round streams are to downtown Bremerton. Native Americans would need that first of all, and then some level ground, and access to deep enough water for canoes. The Kitsap County Museum cannot answer my questions. Kingston meets the requirements and has a Reservation, tribal headquarters, and a casino (the sure marker!). Chico Creek next to Earland's Point and Silverdale are other likely sites. Downtown Bremerton, so near as I can tell flunks on this score, as it seems not to have a year-round water source. Gorst Creek has the water, but at low tide no water access - just a huge mudflat. My next step is the Washington State map showing elevations.
There is a very small piece of Reservation land near Callow and 15th Street. Near it another odd clue is the active Tribal Phinney Bay Cemetery also called Jackson Cemetery. The creek near there does not look very promising for year-round living, but maybe it was better before all the concrete and roofs.
So good of you to share this and your local focus. So many things happened on those ghost streams that drained watersheds (catchments, as some say) that are still topographically defined but contain running water at such different times. And for the streams that exist...the amount of impermeable/less permeable surface is so much greater that the downstream channels and those who live adjacent to them get stressed in new, sometimes unpleasant ways. As for your Front Range friend.....watersheds there have a more flexible meaning! I'd guess that his water, or much of it, was ready to run that shorter distance down the Colorado until it was grabbed and sent through the mountains in a big tunnel and into system of canals...perhaps to run to the Gulf of Mexico, but more likely to be evapotranspired by the lawns and trees of his neighbors.
David, Thanks for your note. Yes, I think you are correct that little of my friend's waters run naturally anywhere and a pipe is its fate in my locations.
One more thing I want to add - on that Puget Sound Watershed map if you click on the streams & lakes it will show your area's waterways. So informative!!
Oh I love this. I am working on a project over in the Maple Valley area. It is the Cedar River Trail in the Landsburg area. This trail was created in 1906-7 by the Milwaukee Railroad and converted to recreation in the last couple decades.
My first goal was to find a closed tunnel and investigate where the railroad diverted the river. Yes they closed off a loop of the river to eliminate two bridges. Still not sure when they did this but it was certainly completed by 1911 when the worst flood in Cedar River history happened.
This flood took out the water supply for Seattle & flooded Renton to where the residents fled to higher ground in a panic.
The worst part was how the flood took out a bridge carrying the water pipe to Seattle from the Cedar River Lake/Dam area.
I have been working on researching this area for quite some time. Mostly lost mines, roads and towns from Cedar Mtn to Black Diamond. I knew about this flood because of my bridge research at Cedar Mtn. I assumed (which is always dangerous) that the pipeline bridge destruction happened at Landsburg where the intake is for our water supply.
But I was so wrong & it is right where I am working on the Railroad tunnel and a strange set of ruins in the brush close by.
So... we need to understand we are plumbed in a way that it only takes one disaster to upend our cart of services. Thank goodness the Engineers eventually eliminated this river crossing and the pipeline no long crosses a river that can flood from a major pineapple express on top of heavy snowfall. Gee that won't happen to us again our modern age!! Right?
Wow, I did not know this history. And, yes, we tend to think that our infrastructure is so very secure, when, as you note, it isn't, particularly in a place as seismically and volcanically and weatherly active as the PNW.
I'd love to hear more about Patrick Trotter and Jason King. A quick Google search only brought up content related to you!
I absolutely love this sort of thing and have been wanting to expand the remit of Writesofway.org to include bodies of water and other things in addition to just streets.
And it has always fascinated me just how some creeks get totally paved over but some still survive in stretches both short (Licton Springs Creek for a block just south of Cascadia Elementary School) and long (Yesler Creek in Bryant/Hawthorne Hills) when they easily could have been eliminated as well....
Many thanks, David, we appreciate your comments about our work. Just one thing I would like to add, and that's a reminder to your readers that our map shows all the streams and other surface water features that were present on the landscape in 1850...where they were located, how they were connected, and where their waters were going when the first EuroAmerican settlers were just beginning to arrive. Again, many thanks.
Recalls a favorite song of mine by Pete Townshend, The Sea Refuses No River. I think I'll have to put it in my rotation for today. Check it out. Here's a snippet:
The sea refuses no river
Whether stinking and rank
Or red from the tank
Whether pure as a spring
There's no damned thing stops the poem
The sea refuses no river
And this river is homeward flowing
. . .
The maps look like another plan for several walking adventures in Seattle. It seems there's always another way to slice the pie. This winter I did peaks and ridge lines while the weather was cool and uphill walking easier. Watersheds will be the inverse.
Thank you for this! Whenever I try to get people to use less (no) fertilizers, herbicides, insecticides or to pick up the dog poop in their own yards by saying 'we all live in a watershed' I get these looks like I'm crazy. It's nice to know I can back up my claim.
By coincidence, over in the Columbia-Methow Valley watershed, we walked a stretch of the Chewuch River yesterday with John Crandall (Aquatic Ecologist and Monitoring Program Coordinator for Methow Salmon Recovery Foundation, and hydrologists from Bureau of Reclamation, based in Boise and Denver. It was the sort of field trip that both informs and delights as they ground-truthed their knowledge through Lidar and remote sensing technologies with the living water, sand, gravel, and biota of this place we call home. Seeing the river's journey through seasons as it travels across the floodplain confirms Macfarlane's reference that "We all live in a watershed."
We are fortunate to share this time and place with others. Enjoy your time with Rob Macfarlane tonight at aptly named Lake Forest Park...and then turn your gaze to the Methow for this weekend's Winthrop Litfest. We welcome folks in this watershed to hear your reflections and insights amidst a day of literary celebration. Info at: https://www.winthroplibraryfriends.org/events
Thank you for writing this, David. Coincidentally, Jason Anthony who writes Field Guide to
the Anthropocene, wrote about watersheds on the same day! I am curious about the map from Trotter and King. I am not able to read it clearly enough so I am not sure, but does the marked wetland in the center of section #29 say "Hubbard Spring"? Hubbard Homestead Park is near that location, named for my grandfather who farmed and lived there from early 1920s to when the property was sold in 1968. I grew up there as well and I remember that crystal-clear spring. My father had hoped that the City of Seattle would daylight the spring when they were constructing the park (after we sold the property, and before it became a city park, it was a Blue Streak park-and-ride-lot). The daylighting was not successful, but not for lack of trying on my father's part -- and thanks to the nice folks at Thornton Creek Alliance for helping him. He/they learned that the spring water had been buried and captured (as you describe) during construction of a building complex just to the north.
I have been kind of researching where the most likely year-round streams are to downtown Bremerton. Native Americans would need that first of all, and then some level ground, and access to deep enough water for canoes. The Kitsap County Museum cannot answer my questions. Kingston meets the requirements and has a Reservation, tribal headquarters, and a casino (the sure marker!). Chico Creek next to Earland's Point and Silverdale are other likely sites. Downtown Bremerton, so near as I can tell flunks on this score, as it seems not to have a year-round water source. Gorst Creek has the water, but at low tide no water access - just a huge mudflat. My next step is the Washington State map showing elevations.
There is a very small piece of Reservation land near Callow and 15th Street. Near it another odd clue is the active Tribal Phinney Bay Cemetery also called Jackson Cemetery. The creek near there does not look very promising for year-round living, but maybe it was better before all the concrete and roofs.
Good luck on your search.
David:
So good of you to share this and your local focus. So many things happened on those ghost streams that drained watersheds (catchments, as some say) that are still topographically defined but contain running water at such different times. And for the streams that exist...the amount of impermeable/less permeable surface is so much greater that the downstream channels and those who live adjacent to them get stressed in new, sometimes unpleasant ways. As for your Front Range friend.....watersheds there have a more flexible meaning! I'd guess that his water, or much of it, was ready to run that shorter distance down the Colorado until it was grabbed and sent through the mountains in a big tunnel and into system of canals...perhaps to run to the Gulf of Mexico, but more likely to be evapotranspired by the lawns and trees of his neighbors.
David, Thanks for your note. Yes, I think you are correct that little of my friend's waters run naturally anywhere and a pipe is its fate in my locations.
One more thing I want to add - on that Puget Sound Watershed map if you click on the streams & lakes it will show your area's waterways. So informative!!
Oh I love this. I am working on a project over in the Maple Valley area. It is the Cedar River Trail in the Landsburg area. This trail was created in 1906-7 by the Milwaukee Railroad and converted to recreation in the last couple decades.
My first goal was to find a closed tunnel and investigate where the railroad diverted the river. Yes they closed off a loop of the river to eliminate two bridges. Still not sure when they did this but it was certainly completed by 1911 when the worst flood in Cedar River history happened.
This flood took out the water supply for Seattle & flooded Renton to where the residents fled to higher ground in a panic.
The worst part was how the flood took out a bridge carrying the water pipe to Seattle from the Cedar River Lake/Dam area.
I have been working on researching this area for quite some time. Mostly lost mines, roads and towns from Cedar Mtn to Black Diamond. I knew about this flood because of my bridge research at Cedar Mtn. I assumed (which is always dangerous) that the pipeline bridge destruction happened at Landsburg where the intake is for our water supply.
But I was so wrong & it is right where I am working on the Railroad tunnel and a strange set of ruins in the brush close by.
So... we need to understand we are plumbed in a way that it only takes one disaster to upend our cart of services. Thank goodness the Engineers eventually eliminated this river crossing and the pipeline no long crosses a river that can flood from a major pineapple express on top of heavy snowfall. Gee that won't happen to us again our modern age!! Right?
Wow, I did not know this history. And, yes, we tend to think that our infrastructure is so very secure, when, as you note, it isn't, particularly in a place as seismically and volcanically and weatherly active as the PNW.
I'd love to hear more about Patrick Trotter and Jason King. A quick Google search only brought up content related to you!
I absolutely love this sort of thing and have been wanting to expand the remit of Writesofway.org to include bodies of water and other things in addition to just streets.
And it has always fascinated me just how some creeks get totally paved over but some still survive in stretches both short (Licton Springs Creek for a block just south of Cascadia Elementary School) and long (Yesler Creek in Bryant/Hawthorne Hills) when they easily could have been eliminated as well....
Ravenna Park (where I grew up) comes to mind. Have fun with Rob Macfarlane tonight!
Many thanks, David, we appreciate your comments about our work. Just one thing I would like to add, and that's a reminder to your readers that our map shows all the streams and other surface water features that were present on the landscape in 1850...where they were located, how they were connected, and where their waters were going when the first EuroAmerican settlers were just beginning to arrive. Again, many thanks.
Patrick, thanks for the clarification!
I love this post, especially this reminder about how colonization dramatically changed how water flows from xačuʔ (Lake Washington) into the Whulge.
Relatedly, I highly recommend the Burke Museum's Waterlines Project map: https://www.burkemuseum.org/static/waterlines/project_map.html
Yes, that is a fine map.
Recalls a favorite song of mine by Pete Townshend, The Sea Refuses No River. I think I'll have to put it in my rotation for today. Check it out. Here's a snippet:
The sea refuses no river
Whether stinking and rank
Or red from the tank
Whether pure as a spring
There's no damned thing stops the poem
The sea refuses no river
And this river is homeward flowing
. . .
The maps look like another plan for several walking adventures in Seattle. It seems there's always another way to slice the pie. This winter I did peaks and ridge lines while the weather was cool and uphill walking easier. Watersheds will be the inverse.
Thanks for the lyrics. And, good luck with the walks!
Here's a link to the song. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vOFyO6IqYk0
Always interesting and informative. Thank you.
Thank you for this! Whenever I try to get people to use less (no) fertilizers, herbicides, insecticides or to pick up the dog poop in their own yards by saying 'we all live in a watershed' I get these looks like I'm crazy. It's nice to know I can back up my claim.
Yeah, I know that feeling of people looking at me like I am nuts when I am trying to share some fun/curious/odd natural history information.
This was great, thanks for including the links to explore mine in Kirkland.
Really looking forward to tonight at Lake Forest Park!
By coincidence, over in the Columbia-Methow Valley watershed, we walked a stretch of the Chewuch River yesterday with John Crandall (Aquatic Ecologist and Monitoring Program Coordinator for Methow Salmon Recovery Foundation, and hydrologists from Bureau of Reclamation, based in Boise and Denver. It was the sort of field trip that both informs and delights as they ground-truthed their knowledge through Lidar and remote sensing technologies with the living water, sand, gravel, and biota of this place we call home. Seeing the river's journey through seasons as it travels across the floodplain confirms Macfarlane's reference that "We all live in a watershed."
We are fortunate to share this time and place with others. Enjoy your time with Rob Macfarlane tonight at aptly named Lake Forest Park...and then turn your gaze to the Methow for this weekend's Winthrop Litfest. We welcome folks in this watershed to hear your reflections and insights amidst a day of literary celebration. Info at: https://www.winthroplibraryfriends.org/events
Craig, Thanks for your note. I am looking forward to sharing the stage with Mr. Macfarlane tonight and then with Dana V on Saturday in Winthrop!