Vegetation And Mechanical Systems For Streambank Erosion Control

Since effective streambank protection measures are costly to install, a determined effort should be made to use vegetation because it is the most readily available material and is relatively inexpensive to obtain. Vegetation greatly reduces the hydraulic forces on the bank and provides other esthetic and environmental advantages over other methods of stabilization. This report describes a series of streambank vegetative studies located on the channels of Johnson, Goodwin and Peters Creek in Panola County near Batesville, Mississippi. On Johnson Creek, there are four sites; two of them use vegetation in conjunction with bank shaping and structural materials, the other two sites use vegetation in conjunction with structural devices without bank shaping. The site of Goodwin Creek uses vegetation in conjunction with bank shaping--with and without structural materials. The Peters Creek sites use woody vegetation in conjunction with structural devices without bank shaping. Criteria used in the design of the combined vegetative and structural projects are presented along with a detailed description of the project sites. Since these type studies require several years to evaluate, only preliminary results are presented and many of them are based on previous experience.