shrubs/trees for preventive soil errosion

[JoeKan]

Hello,
I have a creek behind our house that is beginning to erode. I'm thinking about planting shrubs or trees on the banks of the creek to prevent erosion during high waters. The only time the creek gets high is when it rains, but never overflows.
Can anyone suggest what trees or shrubs would be good for this? I'm thinking of even using something like a weeping willow so the branches can hang down and be a deterrent from the water.
Any thoughts or ideas will be appreciated.
Thanks,
Joe

[Maura]

The locally growing willow shrubs. Cottonwood trees. Wild blue iris.

[Michael Kawalek]

Black locust (Robinia pseudoacacia) It's a nitrogen fixer and is a favorate for erosion control.

[anette]

if you want to use something shorter, daylilies are wonderful at holding soil. you could use the more common orange ones, or get different colored hybrids.

anette

[ronbre]

willows are great, as long as you make sure they are at least 100 feet from your drainfield..and your neighbors

[Darren]

There's a couple of factors that will help you pick something that will work for you. Trees and shrubs that can survive having their root systems flooded are best. Those will have root systems that lie close to the ground. Anything with a taproot will not have as good a chance of living after being flooded. Anything that normally grows on land away from water (on a hillside) such as oaks with the exception of the swamp white oak will not do well. If they live they won't grow as fast and may be more susceptible to insect attack. Plants that are high on the wetland indicator scale will do well if the water table is fairly high.

Sycamore is a bigger tree that can act as an anchor with smaller trees and shrubs closer by. I'd look at the smaller willows such as sandbar willow and bankers willow rather than large willows like the black willow or weeping willow. The smaller willows will spread and create an intertwined root mass. The larger willows may out compete other trees. That's not good if you want a mass effect. There's a lot of willow species that are well suited for erosion control.

The local Natural Resource Conservation Service, NRCS, office can provide you with a list of riparian species. If you can't find an office, each county seat usually has a Farm Services Agency that can get you the information.

NRCS personnel can look at your situation for free and make recommendation. You can buy seed and live plants from Earnst Conservation Seeds. FWIW, there should be a much closer company that specializes in plants for conservation uses for your general area.

[Shadow]

We have a large creek cross the back of our farm. The usable part of the farm is on a cliff about 100 ft above the creek and it is so large it does as it likes. The people that own the bottoms on the other side of the creek asked if they could put some rip rap to keep it from cutting out into their pasture sure no problem to me two years later 32,000 dollars has washed away. We were talking one day and I said I thought I could stop it from changing course but not over flowing if I could get a couple of years before a big flood. They laughed when I said it would cost nothing. transplanted a ton of just plain river cane. Did it with a back hoe. The creek has not moved in years. Just cut 250 bean stakes out of the cane brake in the past two days, cutting only dead mature canes it helps the cane grow. But cane once established is hard to get rid of we mow ours back like a yard with a finish mower. Works for us but if you want the view of the creek you have to have a cliff to look off of like us. Just a thought that works for us.

[silverbackMP]

Some ideas in this University of Missouri Center for Agroforesty Publication (Establishing and Maintaining Riparian Forest Buffers):

http://www.centerforagroforestry.org/pubs/ripbuf.pdf

Bunch of plant info here

http://www.grownative.org/

(It is Missouri focused but Lansing, KS is on the MO/KS border--Dang Jayhawkers J/K)

[mooman]

http://www.ernstseed.com/

This company has good info on erosion control in thier catalogue. They sell the "live stakes" of appropriate species for around .75 cents each.

[crehberg]

I would check with the NCRS. A lot of time they can lead to you free/cheap resources in your area that can help with anything soil erosion related.