Actually, it will be a new mobile home. In September of 2004 I bought 20 acres of land and water in northern Jackson County, Illinois. The property is very narrow--about 330 feet wide--and runs north-south for a half-mile. Coal was strip-mined on the land, probably by CONSOL in the 1970s, and the resulting north-to-south pit filled with water. I do not own the northern tip of the lake or the east shoreline. The land is quite rough at this writing (March 2005). It is too difficult to navigate on foot and will need to be cleared and reshaped by heavy equipment after the land dries out this spring or summer, 2005. My neighbor and I made a brief attempt to bushhog the place, but the large rocks scattered about made that project too risky. The southern half of my parcel is mostly clear but dominated by heavy weed and briar growth, and the northern half is wooded. The east shoreline is also wooded. It is a typical strip-pit scenario.
The lake's shores slope sharply down to its deepest point--probably 50-60 feet at the bottom--and the east and west shorelines run the entire north-south length of the land. The southernmost tip of the lake is shallower and slopes more conventionally into deeper water. the A narrow island--Hill Island, now--parallels my west shoreline for a few hundred meters in the north half of the lake. The water is a beautiful blue-green color--some mix of turquoise and emerald--probably because the mildly acidic water has allowed a population of acid-tolerant Blue-Green Sulfur bacteria (family Chlorobiaceae) to thrive and dominate the aquatic environment. An aquatic biologist I consulted told me it's a classic symptom of these mildly acidic strip pits. Algae and other plant life cannot compete. Sulfur bacteria have chlorophyll in their cells, the same green compound that plants use for photosynthesis, and so the lake literally looks like a giant leaf. These bacteria make their living off the sun and have no interest in human beings, so the water is safe. The pH of the water was measured at a slightly acidic 5.85 and 5.94 in 2002 and at a neutral 7.1 in December 2004, but the buffering presence is only a fraction of what it should be (alkalinity 13.7 ppm, where 100 ppm is preferred). "Buffering" refers to alkaline (basic) compounds in the water that absorb acidity without raising the pH into the basic range. Any kind of acid introduced into the lake will have little to neutralize it, so the pH could drop further into the acidic zone and make survival difficult for anything living in the water. Buffering could be raised to a functional level with about 300 lbs of agricultural limestone per acre of pond, but at this time I do not plan to do so.
The acidity of the water is a mixed blessing; the water will be relatively nutrient-poor, with nothing like the smoky green color and robust phytoplankton-zooplankton balance that would support a broader spectrum of aquatic life, but it is also algae-free and is as clear as distilled water. Visibility is about 35 feet! A jar of the water is crystal-clear; it looks greener the deeper you look, just like a glass of tea looks darker if you view it from the top. A previous owner had full water-screen tests run at the state laboratory in Centralia in 2002, and I also had a few additional tests run (for cyanide, blue-green algae, and pH). All test results were good; the water is fine, and fish are plentiful. Dissolved oxygen content is normal (7.4 ppm). The shorelines are dominated by a very heavy growth of tall reeds, Phragmites communis, also known as Giant Reed. A botanist, Dr. David Brussels, tells me this ubiquitous reed, a member of the grass family, appears on all continents on the planet. He has seen it lining the banks of the Nile, and it is the kind of reed Moses was hidden in. Other grasses or weeds along the shoreline include Broomsedge (Andropogon virginicus); Reed Canary Grass (Phalaris arundinacea), a Class C Noxious Weed from Eurasia; Lespedeza (Serecia Lespedeza); Switch Grass (Panicum Virgatum); and Fescue (Festuca arundinacea). This heavy growth makes walking impossible and will be highly visible in the following photographs.
I will install a 16x76 mobile home oriented north-south along the west shoreline. I will add a large, wrap-around deck to the east and north sides of the home. My original plan was to create some combination of home and aquaculture farm, and I vacillated back and forth between the two for some time. However, it's now clear that the property is too narrow to have a prawn (fresh-water shrimp) pond dug. It may be possible to raise some kind of profitable critter in the lake itself.
All photos were taken with a Nikon digital CoolPix 4800 (4 megapixel) camera. Usually, two exposures were made of the same shot: one at a 1024 kilopixel resolution designed to download quickly and fit on PC screens, and a second at 4 megapixels (4:1 compression), the highest resolution the camera is capable of. The date and time taken show at the lower right corner of each photo.
Hill Island, east channel. The left thumbnail points to a small version (211 KB) of this shot. That's the island on the other side of the channel in this photo. The channel continues northward until its end a few hundred meters out of the shot. There's no way to show all of of the island of course unless I could stand on one end of it. There's the ubiquitous Phragmites communis growing along the shoreline, and an unidentified tree at the left side of the photo. Once again, you can get an idea of the color of the water. The shoreline here apparently drops almost straight down; imagine, some thirty-five years ago, a giant motorized coal shovel on treads (a dragline) scooping up enormous buckets of dirt, rock, and coal. The miners must have just followed the seam--about 60 feet deep--around the island. The wider channel wraps around and continues northward on the east side of the island. The thumbnail at the right points to a much larger version (1540 KB) of the same photo.
The left thumbnail in this photo points to a small version (191 KB) of a shot taken looking back to the southeast. The south tip of Hill Island blocks out most of the eastern channel of the lake, and makes the lake look like a narrow ribbon of water wrapping around the tip and into the foreground of this photo. The amount of sun hitting the Nikon's sensor caused it to damp down, and so that portion of the island in the center looks underexposed. The good thing about this shot is that at the extreme right edge it shows the tip of the point where I will have my trailer installed. That's real haze you can see in the background along the east shoreline--it was a humid, beautiful February morning. The thumbnail at the right of the paragraph is a much larger version (1413 KB) of the same shot. The point where I will be living does not show at this photo's right edge.
The first thumbnail in this paragraph points to a low-resolution (197 KB) shot of Lee's lake taken from the southeast shore looking slightly west of north. Note the Giant Reed ringing the shorelines. The lake actually runs about one-half mile from this point to the north, but not all of it shows in the picture. The center of the photo barely shows the southern tip of Hill Island on the west shore, which is approximately where I will be putting in a mobile home. These photos were taken just after a heavy snowfall had melted, so the lake level should now be about as high as it gets. The utility poles at the left edge of the photo run along the east side of Haulage Road; I will be tapping into one of them (about the fifth pole north) for power to my home. That's a ready-made beach in the foreground, just waiting for some sand and kids. This is the one area of the lake that deepens gradually; you could wade out 30 feet. This photo does a fairly good job of capturing the color of the water, but you really have to see it to believe it. We're looking due north in this shot, but the lake curves slightly to the northwest over its half-mile length, which is why we can't see all the way to the end of it. It loops around somewhat to the left way up there in this shot.
Here's a high-resolution shot (1385 KB, the full 4-megapixel power of the camera) taken a few meters northeast of the preceding photo; it gives a better view of the east shoreline and of the beginning of Hill Island at center left. Again, clicking the thumbnail takes your browser to the larger high-res image. You'll need to scroll around to see all of it. You can see the woodline starting on the east side, and you can see where the woods start on my west side. Those white branches in the left center of the photo belong to the poplar you'll in the following photos. That poplar will probably be in my front yard. We're looking slightly west of north. Haulage Road runs south to north at the left edge of the photo, but it is not visible. The utility poles you see are on my property lining the east side of the road. I own most of the west shoreline of the property, but unfortunately, I do not own the entire east side. I own the land the shot was taken from, but my property on this east side ends a hundred meters or so north in this picture. If you scroll down to the ground at the bottom of the image, you will see the kind of coal-fragment "spoil" on the surface the miners left behind.
Looking east from Haulage Road (named by the mining company, probably for the coal hauled out). Shot from my car parked on the edge of the road. The previous photos were taken along the south-north axis; this and the following shots were taken from the east-west axis, looking east from about the midpoint of the south-north axis. The left photo is a low-res shot (212 KB) taken from my west side, about one-quarter mile north of the preceding photos; the right one is a high-resolution version. We are looking toward the east shoreline. You can see how narrow the lake is. That projecting point of land you see in the center is where the north end of my mobile home will be. At the right edge of the photo you can see my lone tree, a small poplar, in contrast to the wooded east side. I will have to plant and grow my own woods on the west side. The only existing "woods" in this area are the poplar at the right edge of the photo and a couple of baby oaks, which I will try to preserve during the landscaping phase. Yes, that is a small gully penetrating the shoreline, about where my backyard will be. It will have to be filled in and packed down with heavy equipment.
Hill Island, center, looking northeast from Haulage Road. The thumbnail points to a low-res shot (197 KB) taken from the same spot as the preceding photo but angled more toward the northeast. The left channel angling north-northwest off the left edge of the photo parallels the west shore of Hill Island. That is the island itself in the center of the photo. It's a true island, a long, tapering sliver of land maybe 40 feet wide, that never touches any shoreline. The right channel, barely visible at the right edge, continues north another several hundred meters to the northern boundary of my property. The miners just followed the ancient coal seams; I suppose Hill Island exists because there was no coal under it. You can clearly see the Broomsedge growing along the island's shoreline. Note the remnant of someone's fence in the lower left corner of the photo, and the large rock at the island's southern tip, a ubiquitous feature of these mining strip pits. The rock looks deceptively small; actually it is far more than anyone could lift and will probably be there a long time. That's my shadow on the weeds to the lower left.
The thumbnail on the left points to a high-res shot (1462 KB) of the same area in the preceding paragraph. As with the other large images, you'll need to scroll around to see various details of this picture. The thumbnail at right is the same shot but at a low-resolution (198 KB). This last one is a pretty good summation of the mini-bay in the middle of my property. It is the closest I can get at this point to the view I will have from my home, which will be just off the right edge of the photo. None of the pictures truly capture the striking blue-green color of the lake, but the one at the right side of this paragraph comes the closest. At the right edge of this photo, just above the date, you can see a few stems of the accursed briars that weave throughout this property, which makes walking around nearly impossible. All the preceding pictures were taken in January and February, 2005. Other photographs will be added as they are taken.
Both photos in this paragraph were taken from a small elevated knoll just north of the area where I will have my home installed. You can see the indentations in the shoreline (right center) that will have to be filled in. I was looking south-southeast into the sun, and the camera automatically adjusted for the brightness, which resulted in these relatively dark exposures. The left thumbnail points to a big version of the exposure, and the right points to a small version. That's the edge of Hill Island at the left center of the photo. What looks like a thin ribbon of water curling around it is actually the lake wrapping around the island. The narrow channel showing in the bottom left of the photos and the main body of the lake, which barely shows in the shot, continue on north until the end of the island a hundred meters or so out of the frame.
Last Updated 20 July 2005
Hill Island, east channel. The left thumbnail points to a small version (211 KB) of this shot. That's the island on the other side of the channel in this photo. The channel continues northward until its end a few hundred meters out of the shot. There's no way to show all of of the island of course unless I could stand on one end of it. There's the ubiquitous Phragmites communis growing along the shoreline, and an unidentified tree at the left side of the photo. Once again, you can get an idea of the color of the water. The shoreline here apparently drops almost straight down; imagine, some thirty-five years ago, a giant motorized coal shovel on treads (a dragline) scooping up enormous buckets of dirt, rock, and coal. The miners must have just followed the seam--about 60 feet deep--around the island. The wider channel wraps around and continues northward on the east side of the island. The thumbnail at the right points to a much larger version (1540 KB) of the same photo.
