the power of a river.

[gremlin]

should send all the eco nuts here to see a river on the move.

http://www.courierpress.com/news/2011/m ... from-city/

GRAYVILLE, Ill. — Veteran commercial fisherman Johnny Farmer is pessimistic when it comes to any chances the Wabash River will return to Grayville.

After a major flood in 1985, the river cut through an oxbow above Grayville, leaving the town high and dry. Once a magnet for boaters, ski clubs and fishermen, the river at the foot of North Street has turned into a muddy slough that dries up so much in the summertime that city crews have to use a bush hog to keep the weeds down. A modern boat dock that the Illinois Department of Conservation built before 1985 is largely unused.

"With every flood, the river changes," Farmer said. "Will it ever come back to Grayville? I really doubt it. Now, it wouldn't surprise me if it cut through on the Indiana side one of these days; then come back out down by the railroad bridge south of town."

The railroad bridge Farmer is referring to is the former Illinois Central railroad bridge that runs parallel to the twin bridges that carry Interstate 64 across the Wabash into Indiana. Two spans of the historic bridge were swept away during flooding in 2005.

Plans to build a dam upstream to force the river back into its original channel were shot down in a recent Army Corps of Engineers study as being financially unfeasible.

The latest flooding along the Wabash is easing, after heavy rains the past two weeks. The stage at Mount Carmel last Sunday was 27.9 feet, and it is forecast to fall to the 19-foot flood stage by Sunday.

Farmer says he's concerned about what he will find once the river returns to its banks.

"The Corps of Engineers keep the locks and dams on the Ohio open this time of the year to allow farmers access to their land as soon as possible in the spring," Farmer said. "That can make the Wabash drop really fast. It can drop five or six feet in a day, and that really causes some major bank erosion."

Farmer remembers a recent flood that retreated so fast it washed out a quarter-mile of bank upstream near what locals call the Gray Bar. "They had put old car bodies in there to keep it from washing," Farmer said. "The water couldn't get back in the river fast enough, and washed it all out. It's was an amazing sight to see."

Officials with the Illinois Department of Transportation are keeping a close eye on the river because it could threaten the foundation of the I-64 bridges on the Illinois side. Also threatened is the Skeeter Mountain Rest Area, which is on I-64 just inside Illinois.

Grayville Mayor Joe Bisch says the only thing keeping the meandering Wabash from slicing into the sewer lagoon at the rest area is the pile of steel girders that fell into the river when the railroad bridge collapsed.

"Things are pretty tough," Farmer said. "We won't really know what we have until the water finally goes down."

Despite the flooding, and constant changes in the river, Farmer says he's still hanging on. His business, Hard Times Fish Market, is expected to reopen for the season on May 5.

The business includes The Fish House, where Farmer cooks up locally caught Wabash River fish.