Elkhorn Dam Removal

Elkhorn Creek is known for being an exceptional smallmouth fishery. We're going to take a look at the removal of one of the dams, and what it means for the paddling and fishing community!

[@turkson1]

In the early 60's my pals and I would camp up near the transformers and fish the creek. Two of us almost drowned below that dam. Somehow we got spit out. Glad to see it go.

[@tonycox8746]

I'm so glad they took the dam out. Hopefully it'll improve my kayak fishing there in the years to come.

[@dannymckenzie8329]

Dams should never be built with permanence in mind.

[@geneticdisorder1900]

Yaky fishy ❤️❤️ 🐠🐠

[@bindig1]

Yeah, those low dams are scary. I lived in Northeastern Pa years ago. The Lehigh river had many of those and many people drowned getting stuck in the hydraulic backflow

[@MannyQuacioua]

Harrisburg, PA has the most terrifying dam. The Dock Street Dam

[@shaundiltz5821]

The fish will be forever grateful. More and more dams need to continue to be brought down.

[@ThomasBMagwn]

Why?!!?

[@Danndamannn]

Because utilitarian conservation just doesn't work.

[@DaveWasHere112]

We need some dams to create electricity, it’s ok if a few fish die we have a entire ocean

[@itseli4831]

@@Danndamannn faks

[@williamweiss6128]

Here in the west.....

[@MannyQuacioua]

AWESOME FOOTAGE!!! Love it! Thank you for sharing!

[@Fatspurios]

Awesome stuff indeed. Such a good thing . Thanks. UK.

[@joejones2582]

I think you need to have somebody clean up the thousands of tires that’s in the Cumberland River below Thompson Park in Barbourville I mean there are literally thousands of tires down through there And I also think something needs to be done about all the sewage that is running into the river you’ll know what I’m talking about to be ever float down that river I’m sure it’s like that everywhere

[@ProtoNeoVintage]

Started watching this and then went in to grab my wife and the 10-year-old to watch it with them. Not for the dam removal, but for the safety lesson. Neither of them have seen water that rolls like that even though we spend a great deal of time down on rivers. I wanted to make sure that he understood just how dangerous that could be. I'm glad they had video of someone in a life jacket getting sucked back under.

[@yellowgruts8340]

What was the dam originally built for?

[@ericpullen524]

These dams were built originally to slow down and control the river better. Slower deeper water can be used for industrial purposes. Lock and Dam #6 was removed on Green River a few years back and has made paddling it so much better.

[@JM-vp8zc]

Seems like this one was there to provide fire fighting water in case those whiskey barrel houses caught fire. I can only imagine what a nightmare THAT sort of fire would be, with barrels of fuel everywhere.

[@joejones2582]

So what are the plans about all the Asian carp aren’t they going to have access to more water now that you are removing the locks and dams

[@dclrdclr]

the asian carp made it past many, much larger dams on the lower KY river to get to the elkhorn. this dam wasn't keeping them out.

[@inharmonywithearth9982]

Do not pay any mind to the fearmongering of new life. Once a lifeform becomes endemic it is part of the ecosystem. Poisons and barriers will destroy the other rare troubled lifeforms never the intended victim. Invasive species theory is debunked. Please read THE NEW WILD by Fred Pierce. It has new facts for you about the subject of invasive species in every single paragraph with zero filler. There are real life experiments proving additional diversity of habitat is beneficial and isolation and control is negative. The Asian Carp will sucumb to adaptive radiation and become a unique American subspecies of Carp, a valuable part of the ecosystem just as it is in Eurasia.

[@jasontsimnujyang5186]

Omg that one dude almost died!! Glad they got him

[@matthew3136]

As a kayaker, this is a common hazard that people underestimate.

[@kenxiong6830]

Giving the waters back to Mother Nature

[@johnnymoran180]

Those excavator operators getting paid to have so much fun!!

[@Gigitygoo55]

Where can I get some dam bait!?

[@mrmustangman]

at the damn bait shop

[@oceantree5000]

What’s that fish at 6:27?

[@KentuckyAfield]

Longear Sunfish!

[@pango-y8j]

Looks like Bass in the background and the colorful One is a Blue Gill or sunfish

[@pilotboy217]

Well now I know Jim Bean was using creek water for their supply 😳

[@mrmustangman]

did that kayaker die.???

[@dclrdclr]

robert is safe. several others died in prior years, however.

[@JustMe-sb6zt]

Should be more.. Too lazy to pull the kayak out and put back in below then your playing a stupid game.. Stupid games get stupid prizes

[@lag9765]

Good...

[@packerjh2]

The water wasn't always flowing as fast or high as it was in this video

[@packerjh2]

The level they show while removing it was more typically. It was a very mild dam, easily navigated by kayak. The extremes of the undertow highly exaggerated (low overhead dams are far less dangerous than the media wants u to believe!)

[@swayback7375]

@@packerjh2 as someone living within sight of a low head dam, I respectful disagree! I’ve watched a 55g metal drum spin in the boil for over 6 months! To me, the real problem with the dams is that they aren’t needed, it’s not 1850, there’s not a mill around every bend and there’s not enough farms left that irrigate from the water they hold. They’re pointless, except for recreation, and they’re highly detrimental to the natural flow and cycles of the creek. If you can name other reasons we should leave them in place I’d love to hear it, genuinely. My county says “they can’t afford to maintain the dam, the can’t afford to upgrade it into a safer dam and (they claim) they can’t afford to remove it” , improving it costs over $2 million, removal is estimated around $5,000. That’s a no brainer! It’s actually far more dangerous when it’s at summer pool (kind of low) than it is when the water is up, but it depends on the dam and how high the “high water” is. A spring flood was the only thing that washed that drum out, I’ve also watched LARGE not rotten or water logged trees, usually sycamore get hung in the boil… they usually wash out in a few days or weeks but often the only reason they don’t stay longer is because the violent water and rough bottom grind the trees up until there’s nothing left. It’s wild to stand in the bank and watch those big trees roll, a lot of times they’ll try to slip out, then get sucked back in, there’s enough power in then that when the tree rolls or slams back into the dam it hits so hard that you can VERY MUCH feel the ground rumble when they impact. Everyone in central KY SHOULD know just how deadly they are, despite looking totally benign. They pull a dead body out of my dam every few years, same with many of them on the elkhorn, people regularly think it’s safe enough that they can fish from the dam, or use it as a bridge, but the whole length of the dam has water flowing over it, with more force than people think, not to mention they stay slick and slimy… but also idiots think they can make it over in a kayak, or an inner tube. If you check the news you’ll certainly see that a tuber died just last week here while tubing… his son pulled him out, but 🪦. It’s great recreational activity! I’m sure you probably know most of this judging by your name and this channel, and to be fair, driving is dangerous as can be! I’m sure more Kentuckians die in one day on the road than die all year in dams, but that says more about driving than it does about dams.

[@chig9357]

good deal!

[@geneticdisorder1900]

Yak fishy Yak fishy Yak fishy ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

[@edl617]

Glad this was demolish

[@alejandrohernandez7340]

W

[@ukw-uknowho6657]

Ol boy such a fem

[@joepass1883]

Clickbait

[@dski8097]

All fine and dandy if you have consistent flow, but when you have a drought, now nobody will be able to use the river because it will be too low.

[@Celisar1]

Better than a death trap with poor visibility.

[@cochise8531]

All this so somebody in little plastic boats and play in the water. Never mind the homeless living close by.

[@georgeadams5390]

Ok

[@chadthiem8371]

lol you totally missed the whole point of this it’s not just for Kayaks it’s for the health of the stream

[@AnthroGuitarist]

Where I live, dams block salmon from coming upstream from the ocean. Dams reduce the amount of fish that we can get from the water

[@davidfishguy]

Ask your congressman why they're sending billions overseas when homeless starve in your neighborhood.

[@Papapickles69]

That is cool they didn’t delay the project, obviously it was going to take some money to do and no one is dying to spend any now a days. Heck yeah Kentucky.

[@assmsn]

That was a barrier for the f or Asian carp they couldn't get through now you just opened up the door for that River

[@inharmonywithearth9982]

They already made it as far as they wanted. They only survive in muddy bottom slow moving very large rivers.