Cedar Revetment

By Kelsey Brock, Southern District, Mankato Field Crew

It’s nearly the end of the summer, and by now our crew has done a good variety of projects. One of my favorites so far has been a cedar revetment project at Jack Creek in Brewster, MN. For this, we worked with Catherine Wegehaupt, an awesome project host and Watershed Technician for the Heron Lake Watershed District.

The purpose of cedar revetments is to stop erosion from happening along stream banks. This is done by anchoring in cedar trees to the stream bank so that they help slow down the current and allow sediment to build up over time. The ultimate goal here is to that the bank will have re-stabilized when the cedars later decay.

Excited to try something new, our crew hoisted up our waders- we later found out which ones had holes in them and which didn’t. Setting up an assembly line, we waded out with arms full of cables, anchors, clips, hammers, and oh yeah- trees that weighed as much as I do. I think you can imagine the awkward mess this was as we tried to keep the entire creek from entering our waders. We failed at this miserably. We did, however, successfully anchor all the trees into the bank, and had a lot of fun doing so. Also we met a dog, Annie, who offered the moral support we needed to finish out the project.