© 1998 Streamline Publications

Pioneered by Albright Seed Company, the Living Channel Liner takes a good idea and goes a step beyond, to create a break-through in erosion control. Biogeotechnology is becoming recognized as a newer, better, approach to erosion control in several problem areas, but notably in channel stabilization.

Biogeotechnology (biological and geotechnical engineering) is an amazingly gentle, yet most effective, approach to a hard problem— stabilizing intermittent and continuous flow water channel banks.
Past solutions to erosion prevention in drainage channels relied on hard engineering. To cite an extreme example, the famous Los Angeles River—a 58-mile long, mostly concrete, conduit winding through its namesake city is a tribute to the brute-force school of engineering. Today, the concrete river bed and banks make a fine setting for Hollywood action movies but are short on aesthetics, animal or plant life. For much of the year the concrete river accomodates a bare trickle of water amidst graffiti, garbage and the city's castoffs.

A Concrete Solution
In 1938 a devastating flood marked the river as the enemy. By this time the Los Angeles Aquaduct was in operation and the river became a secondary, unreliable, water source. The Army Corps of Engineers took up the battle with the technology of the day—cement and stone—and created a giant storm drain where once the river had flowed. When the Army engineers were finished, most of the river's length was sheathed in concrete, forever keeping the waters within its boundaries. In a city of millions that is essentially a desert, unchecked water flow is a menace to humans and property. Yet, in Los Angeles, there is nostalgia for the river. Plans are being put forth for a more natural environment and restoration of the surrounding ecosystem.
Humans are drawn to water. It refreshes, fascinates, and indeed, is essential to human life.

A Better solution
The destructive force of water is the Mister Hyde in this equation. Biogeotechnical engineering combines living vegetation and the earth's natural properties using scientific principles to control the loss of soils, the structures they support, and to limit the enormous cost of clean up after rainfall.
And while the Los Angeles River may seem an intractable political and ecological problem, on a smaller scale there is a practical solution.
A number of manufacturers have devised channel lining geotextiles that, once securely in place, can protect seeds and soils through the germination period to eventual establishment—if it doesn't happen to rain in the meantime.
These products are excellent as a nonbiodegradable environment for plant life that will have to withstand periodic flood conditions and continuous flow.
But there is a problem of timing their installation. A fully established riparian plant system is necessary to withstand the ripping pressures of rapidly flowing drainage waters. Otherwise it becomes a source of more debris on its way downstream. Most erosion control projects are pursued during summer tnonths—when waterflow is down and equipment and men don't have to fight the elements. This is the least hospitable season for establishing a living, robust community of water grasses, especially in Mediterranean climates such as California's.
S&S Seeds has the answer in our Living Channel Liner. We have taken the MIRAMAT IOOOTM Erosion Control Mat—a proven product—and have pregrown in it a living complex of native riparian grasses.
The result is an economical, ecologically sound, self-maintaining system that physically secures stream banks or shore lines. Not only does the Living Channel Liner hold the soil, but it becomes the basis for a full wetland community with attendant benefits such as water purification and filtration. Micro organisms gain a foothold in this new environment and act to biodegrade pollutants; sediments are caught and stabilized and biodiversity is encouraged.
Result: the damaging effects of storm runoffs are reduced, bank undercutting is prevented.
Living Channel Liner is immediately effective once in place. The rnature growth eliminates the period of vulnerability a new planting would face. Install today for tomorrow's storm.
And we haven't even discussed the beauty inherent in a watercourse that greets the eye with green, supple grass. No concrete needed.
Call your erosion control consultant at S&S Seeds, toll free, to discuss your needs and to learn rnore about how the Living Channel Liner can fit into your plans.

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