Acknowledging A History of Degradation

Big Sioux River shoreline near Beresford, SD. Row crop farming across the river basin has dramatically altered many aspects of the Big Sioux River.

Robert Kelly Schneiders’ principal contributions to the arena of environmental history have been his indepth investigations and assessments of Missouri River development. In numerous articles, reports and two books he explains the unfortunate reality that development and manipulation of the Missouri has been short-sighted, ecologically catastrophic and unsustainable. On his website, eco IN THE KNOW, Schneiders shifts his attention to the Big Sioux River. It is revealing reading.

Schneiders opens his report with this statement: “What follows is a brief overview of how the Big Sioux went from a clear, biologically-diverse, prairie river to one from the most hydrologically erratic, polluted and ecologically compromised rivers in the United States.”

Schneiders continues, “The pre-settlement Big Sioux ran clear from its head to its mouth. The reason for the river’s clarity had a lot to do with the vegetation growing across [the river’s] drainage basin, especially the prairie grass known as big bluestem.”

Much of Schneiders’ analysis emphasizes the way land in the Big Sioux watershed has been used, and how changes regarding those uses has impacted tributaries and the main stem of the Big Sioux. He documents those changes with data and focuses on one Iowa country -Sioux County, located between Sioux Falls and Sioux City- to illustrate and underscore the fact that pervasive changes in land use accompanied and significantly contributed to river degradation.

Flooding, especially severe flooding along the Big Sioux, hardly existed before row crop agriculture came to dominate the landscape. But then wetlands were drained, prairie was destroyed, and ever-increasing tracts of land were planted to shallow-rooted, annual crops. Without wetlands absorbing runoff and deep-rooted perennial grasses and forbs holding soils in place, runoff into the river dramatically increased, and at a fast pace, overwhelming tributaries and the main channel with eroded soils. This reduced carrying capacity and mantled the channel’s sandy bottom with mud. That led to persistent flooding.

Schneiders says that before significant land use changes swept through the river’s watershed, the river’s shoreline was dotted by beaches and was grassy and gradual. Now the river’s shoreline frequently features steep, abrupt cutbanks and sticky, silty deposits at river’s edge. The river’s altered hydrology has degraded aesthetics, water quality and ecology.

Schneiders’ report also describes the checkered history of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the river, including a 1960 plan to channelize the lower Big Sioux, destroying the river’s character to address the rising problem of flooding. Local and national outdoor groups and two Iowa governors successfully led the charge opposing the channelization plan. Later, in 1969, the Corps proposed a series of dams across the river, including a massive structure near Flandreau. Early environmentalists helped stop that misguided blueprint.

Schneiders makes no recommendations for fixing the river, but his explanations regarding river problems associated with land use are worth noting as we work to repair the river and transform it into a waterway that reflects public spirit and pride.