Copperhead Canyon

Copperhead Canyon is a hollow rich in visible Karst geology.  The creek at the bottom of Copperhead Canyon begins at the Madonnaville Cave.  The cave has a long history of exploration by locals, including Charles Duryea who visited in around 1882.  He was in Monroe City performing a technology upgrade at the Mill which included converting it from water-wheel power to steam.  Duryea and his brother would go on to build one of the first steam powered automobiles at their shop in Ohio.  Check out my YouTube video of the cave with a high-water flow.

The Madonnaville Cave

Several hundred yards downstream, in 2013 we discovered ancient Brachiopod beds in the creek bedrock.  A University of Illinois geologist says they were probably churned into a pile by an ancient ocean storm. They have been obscured for ages, until erosion revealed them.  The Brachiopod beds are extremely fragile.  I fear that erosion will take a rapid toll.  Already, several layers have been peeled away. Below is a photo of the Brachiopod bed.

The Brachiopod Bed

An additional 300 yards downstream, we come to an area where the underlying Karst formations actually drain the creek water underground.   For over 80 years, we have known that the creek drains into the ground here.  But we have never been able to see the point at which it actually goes underground.  In 2013, erosion finally revealed at least 3 distinct holes the water drains into.  The creek actually runs dry for 200 yards, until a point right at the Baum Road bridge. There, the water begins to flow again. But I believe the water source is not part of the upstream flow.  In the summer of 2013 I poured pond dye into the most downstream hole where the water disappears.  It never emerged from underground, as far as I can tell.  Make sure you see my YouTube videos.  One shows water draining into a hole.  The other shows me pushing my walking stick down into a crevice.  I was able to take a length of plastic conduit and push it about 6 feet into the crevice.

One of the holes where the creek drains

Also in this area where the creek runs dry, in 2013 a hole or "vent" appeared at the edge of the field about 20 yards southeast of the creek.  When it rains heavily, water emerges from under ground, and flows from the vent to the creek. The vent is about 10 feet across and currently around 4 feet deep.  The bottom is a layer of gravel.  I have stood in it, without falling through.  The flow of water coming from it is substantial and creates a channel of water about 4 feet wide and 3 feet deep.  For many years previous, a much smaller hole 20 feet out into the field vented water during rainstorms.  Since the larger hole has opened, no water emerges from the small vent.  I also have a video on YouTube of water flowing from the vent.

The large vent

We call this Copperhead Canyon because there seems to be an over abundance of copperhead snakes.  We see more copperheads here than at any other spot on the farm.  It was in this field where a live copperhead was in in one end of a hay bale while I was pulling it onto the wagon from the other end.  I stacked it on the wagon without realizing anything unusual.  As we turned the corner at the end of the field, Al Steinmann, who was driving,  pointed to the side of the wagon. I looked back and saw the copperhead sticking out of the bale, striking furiously at the air.

Just uphill at the rim of the canyon is Schneider Michael's Buchel.  This is where HR Baum and Al Steinmann always told a story of plowing out copperhead after copperhead in the field one spring.  There are at least six sinkholes in and around the field, with the vent described above located at the bottom of the field.

I've always suspected that the Karst features, so near the surface here, have provided a hospitable environment for copperheads.