Saturday, July 25, 2009

Flooding

Yesterday afternoon, we had more than 40 mm of rain in about two hours. I was at work, and missed the flooded streets, but these two photos are of the path between the catchment basin and the marsh where Jake and I can usually walk without getting out feet wet. Annie just goes for a wade here and there. The first photo was taken at 7 PM, while the second was at 7 AM, and shows the top of the storm drain in the middle of the "hill", about six feet above water level where the turtles laid their eggs in the spring. They have drowned by now...
Last night, in order to get this photo, we had to wade through water in the ditches that was over my knees. The dogs had to swim about four feet. Neither of them were impressed. This morning, Annie and I could splash through, and Jake could jump over what was left.

This clump of cattails is usually at the edge of the water.

This small tributary to the Carp River is usually about 5 feet wide.

This duck family from spring is on that tributary, a bit upstream,

while this was what it looked like last night.

All of this area was developed to protect the houses surrounding it from flooding, but a lot of people had two feet of water in their basements yesterday. We were lucky to only have a couple of gallons come in the basement window. There are rumours that a couple of people were electrocuted in their flooded basements.

6 comments:

Jenn Jilks said...

OMG
Such water.
I am grateful to be above the lake. That said, we do get a river through our basement seeing as we are built on the Precambrian Shield and the rocks take up much of our basement.
We have rivers in spring. You learn to live with it!

Wynnie said...

Glad to hear you didn't get too much flooding. Pity you were working. That kind of storm would have been something to see, though idealy from under some kind of overhang rather than actually out in it. i don't think that's the kind of rain that would be fun to walk in. Poor turtles though

Lavender and Vanilla Friends of the Gardens said...

We always say, why does it all pour down in one day. When we were looking for land with good rainfall we did not know that all the rain would fall in one week!
Electrocuted in their basement, that does not sound to good. The pictures look lovely with all this ponds and streams. They attract quickly all sort of waterloving creatures with and without boots!

George said...

That is a lot of rain for a short period of time. I'm glad that there wasn't more flooding. You got some great pictures.

Carletta said...

It's supposed to beginning raining tomorrow for about four days. I hope it will be staggered and not constant to let the water run off.
Even so - I love that third shot of the water and grass - lovely.

Kirigalpoththa said...

Those duck must be having a great time :)

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I'm a 50 something female set loose on the world with a camera.