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years' time it was but a sand bed, and he had to obtain galvanised tanks to secure water for his household. 
No doubt many of these deep ravines and washaways have been caused by cattle tracks ; these soon become 
watercourses, and then good-bye to your beautiful meadow flats and Vater supply. (J. F. Mann, in a 
letter to the Author.) 
(d) Chamfering of Banks. I would recommend that the soft banks be 
chamfered in some places. Where soft banks overhang, as we see in many places, 
they fall over and tear away enormous quantities of soil. One sees the remains of 
trees in many of the banks, and they do damage in precisely the same way as do the 
embedded boulders already referred to. 
(e) An American Proposal. I desire to bring pi'ominently under notice the 
simple method of dealing with caving river banks by means of a paling of willows 
interlaced with wire, as described in the following statement and illustration t 
Caving River Banks. At many places along the stream the flood has left perpendicular banks of 
soft soil that are being constantly undermined by the current, causing the land to cave into the river from 
time to time. It is very important that such places be protected, for every such caving bank is a menace 
to all the land lying back of it in the valley. 
In such a valley, where the bed of the stream does not come within scores of feet of bedrock, the 
use of stone structures for protecting the river banks is very expensive, and at the same time ineffective. 
The most successful method of protecting a soft alluvial river bank is to make it sloping instead of 
perpendicular, and to keep it covered -with vegetation. 
The willow is admirably adapted to holding alluvial soil in place. It is far more serviceable for 
this purpose than walls of masonry, and the facility with which it reproduces itself by seeds, suckers, 
sprouts, and cuttings, both natural and artificial, makes its use very simple and inexpensive. 
The great difficulty with planting any sort of tree on perpendicular banks is that the caving of the 
soil is so rapid that the planted tree has no opportunity to get a start before it is undermined and 
precipitated into the river. An excellent scheme has Iteen proposed by Mr. V,. Bayles, Linwood, Kansas. 
The plan is as follows : Green willow poles, 18 to 20 feet long, are secured in the spring, just after the ice 
goes out of the stream. These poles are laid on the ground near the bank 2 feet apart, with their butts 
all pointing toward the river. Woven fence wire is then stretched along over the poles, and stapled fast 
to each one. Sections of wire about 100 feet long can be handled to best advantage. After the wire has 
been securely fastened to the poles, they are all pushed over the bank together, so that the butts of the 
poles will fall and sink into the soft mud at the water's edge. As the bank caves oft' some of the falling 
soil will lodge on the wire, partially burying and weighing down the poles, which will consequently strike 
root and grow. The wire will serve to hold the mass of willows together until they have become firmly 
rooted. The ends of the woven wire should be made fast to wire cables running back over the bank some 
distance and fastened to posts set firmly in the ground. The caving and erosion of the bank will soon 
round off its top corners, and the growing willows at the water's edge will catch the soil as it rolls down 
the declivity, causing a bank to form of just the right slope to resist erosion most effectually. The 
following diagram illustrates the method of fastening the poles to the wire. (United States Department 
of Agriculture, Bureau of Forestry, Circular No. 27, by Pinchot.) 
(/) Planting and Conservation. It appears to be very necessary to educate 
people not to destroy timber and other vegetation on the banks and in the beds 
of creeks, and in certain places to proceed with replanting. It is quite true that 
re-planting may in many cases mean the utilisation of good land ; it is equally true 
that if remedial measures be not proceeded with, ther<' will eventually be no good 
land left to plant on at all. Planting close to the edge is, I reiterate, a mistake, and 
arises from a natural desire to make the most of the land to cultivate as much as 
possible for crops or grass. But trees and other plants placed too near the edge of 
a friable bank may be a source of danger, and not a real protection, since they may 
act as a lever to break down the banks. 
D 
