The Cache River Wetlands
Pathway to Preservation

Rachel Needham
Anna-Jonesboro Community High School, Anna

The Cache River Wetlands in southern Illinois contain some of the most diverse habitats in the United States. Beginning northeast of Anna, Illinois, the Cache River historically flowed south through five counties until reaching the Ohio River. In 1950 a diversion canal and dike diverted the flow of the Cache into the Mississippi River in Alexander County. Located within the Cache River Wetlands are three nature preserves, eleven state champion trees, and fifty-six state endangered or threatened animal and plant species.

The Cache River was formed at the end of the Great Ice Age. Present-day southern Illinois was engulfed under shallow seas until the end of the Pennsylvanian Period when the water receded and the region's elevation rose. Approximately one million years ago, vast glaciers covered a majority of Illinois. At the end of the last glacial advance, the melting ice flooded and altered the stream channels of the Ohio River. Scientists believe that ten thousand to thirteen thousand years ago the Ohio River changed its course to a channel in the south where it is currently located. The geography of the Cache River proves that it is the deserted riverbed of the Ohio River.

The three main tributaries that flow into the Cache Wetlands are Big Creek, Cypress Creek, and Limekiln Slough. The Cache Wetlands are composed of several ponds and swamps. Little Black Slough and Heron Pond form the largest cypress-tupelo swamp in the state of Illinois. Buttonland Swamp is located beside the Lower Cache channel, and cypress trees there are estimated to be more than a thousand years old.

Native Americans from Arkansas, Kentucky, and Indiana came to the Cache annually each fall to gather food and hunt game. It is not known when the first white settler encountered the Cache Wetlands, but it is thought to be before 1670. In the 1700s Pierre Mermet, a French explorer, named the river "Cache" because it looked like a great basin. Some trappers and hunters became very familiar with the Cache River area before the Revolutionary War. A hunter led George Rogers Clark and his soldiers through the forests and marshes of the Cache River on their journey in 1778 to Kaskaskia, Illinois. In 1812 some families lived near the Lower Cache River. The abundance of mosquitoes, many diseases, the difficulty to clear and cultivate the land, and scarceness of sanitary drinking water were all reasons that discouraged additional settlers from making the Cache River their home.

In the 1850s sawmills were established beside the Cache River, and after 1870 the timber business began to rapidly increase. In 1871, in what is present-day Karnak, a sawmill, post office, store, and homes made up the small settlement called Cachetown. The Main Brothers Box Lumber Company came to Pulaski County in 1898 and established a sawmill on the edges of the Cache. This company sent logs down the Cache River all the way to just south of New Columbia, which is located between present-day Vienna and Metropolis. For twenty years the Main Brothers Company cut two million feet of lumber per year from the Big Black Slough region.

Logging was not the only factor destroying the rich forests and marshes of the Cache Wetlands. Farmers saw great potential in the Cache Wetlands as being rich farmland. The many efforts to drain the wetlands damaged the area immensely by causing erosion and siltation. In 1916 the Post Creek Cutoff was dug from the Heron Pond area to the Ohio River in order to more rapidly and directly drain the Upper Cache River watershed. The Cache River Drainage District sponsored the Post Creek Cutoff construction. When this ditch was first completed, it was quite small, yet over time the water rushing through it eroded the sediment and widened the ditch. Currently the silt that is being eroded away is finding its way into Buttonland Swamp and killing the cypress trees. The width of Long Reach, the main channel of the Cache River, had declined from two hundred feet to approximately fifty feet in a brief six years.

In June 1979 The Citizens Committee To Save the Cache was formed. Local citizens were extremely concerned about the growing desolation of the Lower Cache River. The organization wanted to educate the public about the innumerable natural resources in the Cache River. The committee circulated a petition signed by two thousand concerned citizens and presented it to the drainage district commissioners. The Citizens Committee hoped to restore the current in the Cache River and repair the damaged Long Reach by the use of dams. The committee requested the assistance of the Illinois Department of Conservation and the Nature Conservancy in 1982 and 1983.

There are several endangered and threatened animal species that inhabit the Cache Wetlands. The bald eagle and barn owl are just a few of the animals on the Illinois endangered list. The grey bat and the Indiana bat are two species found in the Cache wetlands that are federally endangered. Endangered plant species, such as sedge and thoroughwort are also located in the haven of the Cache forests.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Nature

26 ILLINOIS HISTORY / FEBRUARY 2002

Conservancy, Ducks Unlimited, and the Illinois Department of Conservation formed a partnership in 1991. A sixty-thousand-acre tract of the Cache River area has been set aside by the Cache River Wetlands Joint Venture for restoration and preservation. The Henry N. Barkhausen Cache River Wetlands Center will also be open by the summer of 2002.

Though the many local, state, and federal groups are helping to protect the Cache Wetlands, future generations bear the responsibility of preserving or restoring this natural wonder. The Cache Wetlands are one of two wetland conservation areas in Illinois. The other is the Emiquon Project located in central Illinois on the Illinois River. The Cache is unique because it contains genuine southern swamps at the northern extent of their range.

The Cache River Wetlands are significant to the state of Illinois and also the entire nation.—[From Citizens Committee, "Citizens Committee to Save Cache River, Inc."; Anna Gazette Democrat, May 31, 1979; Cypress Creek National Wildlife Refuge, "The Cache River Wetlands Center"; Cairo Evening Citizen, Sept. 14, 1979; Paul Dye, Waters of the Heartland; Max D. Hutchison, Lower Cache Preservation Plan; student historian's interview with Max Hutchison, Oct. 21, 2001; student historian's interview with Neal Needham, Oct. 20, 2001; Kathleen Rude, "Cache Value," Reclaiming the Cache (1989); Beverly Scobell, "Cache River Former Conservation Director Honored," Illinois Issues, Oct. 1, 2001.]