Battling Mother Nature

As I stated in a previous post, there has been unprecedented water levels and releases up and down the Missouri River.  From Montana to Missouri, communities along the River have been affected by these levels.  The picture above was taken at the Oahe Dam Stilling Basin when they were releasing somewhere around 55,000 cubic feet per second.  On June 7th, the Corps began releasing 150,000 cfs out of the dam powerhouse and stilling basin.  Over the weekend the Corps increased those releases to 160,000 cfs due to rain that was falling in the area.  The releases are meant to keep the water from spilling over the emergency spillway, which would cause even more disastrous flooding to the cities of Pierre and Ft. Pierre.  The water level has been within inches of the top of the spillway, but the Corps is determined to keep water from going over the spillway or opening the gates for increased flows.  The maximum output of Oahe Dam is supposed to be somewhere around 165,000 cfs.  The Corps was originally hoping that they would not have to go above the 150K.  Levees were built to protect the cities at a projected elevation with flows at that level.  So far, the levees are holding, but releases are expected to stay at this level into August.

All four of the dams in South Dakota along the Missouri River are releasing at 150,000 cfs.  That's over 1 million gallons per second.  It's hard to gain a perspective on that, but there are tons of videos and pictures of the flooding and releases online.  They still don't do it justice.  Brandon, works for the Corps, at Big Bend Dam in Fort Thompson, and has been busy monitoring water levels and the damage that the flows are causing to surrounding landscapes.  Fishing and other recreation has been affected, but the long-term affects will not be know for several months, and maybe not until next year and beyond.

The last time we even came close to an event like this was in the late 1990's when releases neared 80,000 cfs.  On lake Oahe, above Pierre, prey fish populations were decimated and walleye and other predatory game fish began to basically starve to death.  Time will only tell, but where access is possible the fishing has been pretty good so far.

I've noticed that although we're fighting flooding in this area, others are praying for rain all along the south to fight off drought and fires.  Along with all the other tornadoes and other weather events it's been a busy spring that has affected many of you.  Wishing everyone well, and we look forward to hearing from and seeing all of you this fall.

How about an update?

It's been a long time coming, but I'm finally getting around to getting you all up to date on what's been going on.  Rain, working around the rain, more work, and more rain.  That's about it.  I know that many of you across the U.S. have been dealing with different types of weather events, and we hope here at the Snake Den that all of you are fairing well while battling Mother Nature.

It's been a busy summer/spring with lots of concrete work getting done in a short amount of time.  We're nearly done with the spring bins that need to be ready by harvest in mid-July.  We've completed the task with only one full week of work since the beginning of May.  Rain has shortened our work week almost every week since we got started, but we've managed to keep chugging along.  We've also managed to get about 75 % of our food plots in.  They should do well once it dries out and the sun warms things up.  Once it dries out we'll get the remaining ones in which should take off with all the moisture.

We really haven't been out enough to get a good handle on how the pheasants are doing, but I'm sure they're ready for some dry weather also.  Cool and wet is better than hot and dry, and with the birds that we had left over things should be very good come fall.  We've come across several nests that have hatched out, but have yet to see any number of chicks.  By the first of July things should really start to turn around and we'll get a better handle on how the new crop of chicks is coming.  It will most likely be a late and drawn out nesting period with the cool, wet spring that we've had.  The normal peak for hatching is around the middle of June, but like last year it will most likely last well into July.



We have managed to get a little fishing in, along with some test-netting to check on our ponds that we have stocked.  Cordie and Marlys fought the rain yesterday while fishing with Brandon's dad, Brad, and managed to pull in their limit of walleye up by Fort Thompson.  The fishing has also been affected with the unprecedented water levels that we are seeing on the Missouri River.  Brandon has been busy on flood watch as his dam has been one that has surpassed record levels and releases.  I'll post more on that later.  The bass are doing well in in the stocked pond, and the bluegills and perch look like they may need a supplemental stocking to boost their numbers.  Below is a picture of the net catch I got in our bass/bluegill pond.  The bluegills are slightly outnumbered, but that has to happen for a good sized population.  Kellen snagged a pretty good bass out of Brakke Dam the other day, and we managed to bag a few walleyes shore fishing near Chamberlain.  That pretty much wraps up the fishing excursions, but it's early in the summer so there will certainly be more.

The golf course is in good shape, but we've managed to only get a few rounds in there also.  It should look good well into fall, so for those of you that have preserve hunts booked in September and early October, you may have another activity to fill the hours between hunting pheasants.  Before we know it September will be here.  Looking forward to it.