Stream improvements kosher?

[lestrout]

I was looking over several streams to see how Irene and the record rains have affected them. Some of my favorite pools and runs have been gritted in, that is to say, the deposits are coarser than silt. I don't see my usual marker trouts hanging near the rocks that have lost their nice undercuts due to the grit.

Is there a legal or other reason why someone couldn't go in there with a spade and restore some of the undercuts? This would increase and improve habitat for bugs, crayfish, sculpins and such, which would in turn make the spots more agreeable to trouts.

tl
les

 

[Maurice]

Can't do it legally without a permit. But Ma nature don't need one and she will clean it out next big storm, count on it.

Look up or downstream the scour moved the bedload to that area it had to come from somewhere. There you will find the lies.

Moving it with a shove is futile, not only is it the wrong tool for the job but it will fill back in without upstream flushing characteristics.

 

[phillyfly]

how about just removing a giant tree branch from your favorite hole? still illegal?

 

[troutbert]

phillyfly wrote:
how about just removing a giant tree branch from your favorite hole? still illegal?

Probably not illegal, if on your own land.

Not beneficial to the stream, though.

"Wood is good."

 

[CLSports]

Let it be. Let it be. Let it be, yeah Let it be.
Whisper words of wisdom, let it be

 

[Chaz]

Yeah let it be, I see folks cutting everything that falls into streams, and really with all of the alteration man has made to streams, wood is good. You find pools and good habitat everywhere you find trees in streams. It's part of why we want forested buffers, but some people don't quite get that part.
Trees capture silt, and sediment and create pools. The more pools in a stream the more fish a stream will hold. Not because fish like pools, but because pools are refuge areas for fish, they protect fish from very cold weather, and ice, and the protect fish during the summer they are also a refuge from heat.