South Branch Bowman Creek (also known as Cherry Run) is a

tributary A tributary, or affluent, is a stream or river that flows into a larger stream or main stem (or parent) river or a lake. A tributary does not flow directly into a sea or ocean. Tributaries and the main stem river drain the surrounding drainage ...

Bowman Creek Bowman Creek (also known as Bowmans Creek or Bowman's Creek) is a tributary of the Susquehanna River in Luzerne County and Wyoming County, in Pennsylvania, in the United States. It is approximately long and flows through Ross Township and Lake To ...

Luzerne County, Pennsylvania Luzerne County is a county in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of , of which is land and is water. It is Northeastern Pennsylvania's second-largest county by total area. As of ...

, in the United States. It is approximately long and flows through Fairmount Township and Ross Township. The watershed of the creek has an area of . The surficial geology in its vicinity consists of alluvial fan, alluvium, Wisconsinan Ice-Contact Sratified Drift, fill, lakes, Boulder Colluvium, Wisconsinan Till, Wisconsinan Bouldery Till, wetlands, and bedrock. Most of the creek is in

Ricketts Glen State Park Ricketts Glen State Park is a Pennsylvania state park on 13,193 acres (5,280 ha) in Columbia, Luzerne, and Sullivan counties in Pennsylvania in the United States. Ricketts Glen is a National Natural Landmark known for its old-growth fore ...

. It has one named tributary, which is known as Cherry Run. The creek's watershed is designated as a High-Quality Coldwater Fishery and a Migratory Fishery.

Course

South Branch Bowman Creek begins in a

wetland A wetland is a distinct ecosystem that is flooded or saturated by water, either permanently (for years or decades) or seasonally (for weeks or months). Flooding results in oxygen-free (anoxic) processes prevailing, especially in the soils. The ...

in Fairmount Township. It flows north for several hundred feet before flowing in an easterly direction for several tenths of a mile. The creek then turns north for several tenths of a mile before heading east-northeast. In this reach, it receives Cherry Run, its only named tributary, from the

left Left may refer to: Music * ''Left'' (Hope of the States album), 2006 * ''Left'' (Monkey House album), 2016 * "Left", a song by Nickelback from the album ''Curb'', 1996 Direction * Left (direction), the relative direction opposite of right * L ...

. It then turns east-southeast before turning east-northeast again and passing through Mount Spring Lake. From the eastern end of the lake, the creek flows east-northeast for a few tenths of a mile before reaching its confluence with Bowman Creek. South Branch Bowman Creek joins Bowman Creek upstream of its mouth.

Tributaries

South Branch Bowman Creek has one named tributary, which is known as Cherry Run. Cherry Run joins South Branch Bowman Creek upstream of its mouth, near Mountain Springs, and drains an area of .

Geography and geology

The elevation near the

mouth In animal anatomy, the mouth, also known as the oral cavity, or in Latin cavum oris, is the opening through which many animals take in food and issue vocal sounds. It is also the cavity lying at the upper end of the alimentary canal, bounded on ...

of South Branch Bowman Creek is above

sea level Mean sea level (MSL, often shortened to sea level) is an average surface level of one or more among Earth's coastal bodies of water from which heights such as elevation may be measured. The global MSL is a type of vertical datuma standardised g ...

. The elevation of the creek's

source Source may refer to: Research * Historical document * Historical source * Source (intelligence) or sub source, typically a confidential provider of non open-source intelligence * Source (journalism), a person, publication, publishing institute o ...

is between above sea level. The

surficial geology Superficial deposits (or surficial deposits) refer to geological deposits typically of Quaternary age (less than 2.6 million years old). These geologically recent unconsolidated sediments may include stream channel and floodplain deposits, beach ...

in the lower reaches of the valley of South Branch Bowman Creek mainly consists of

alluvium Alluvium (from Latin ''alluvius'', from ''alluere'' 'to wash against') is loose clay, silt, sand, or gravel that has been deposited by running water in a stream bed, on a floodplain, in an alluvial fan or beach, or in similar settings. Alluv ...

alluvial fan An alluvial fan is an accumulation of sediments that fans outwards from a concentrated source of sediments, such as a narrow canyon emerging from an escarpment. They are characteristic of mountainous terrain in arid to semiarid climates, but a ...

, Wisconsinan Ice-Stratified

Drift Drift or Drifts may refer to: Geography * Drift or ford (crossing) of a river * Drift, Kentucky, unincorporated community in the United States * In Cornwall, England: ** Drift, Cornwall, village ** Drift Reservoir, associated with the village ...

, and a lake. However, there is also fill and Boulder

Colluvium Colluvium (also colluvial material or colluvial soil) is a general name for loose, unconsolidated sediments that have been deposited at the base of hillslopes by either rainwash, sheetwash, slow continuous downslope creep, or a variable combinatio ...

, which is rich in

boulder In geology, a boulder (or rarely bowlder) is a rock fragment with size greater than in diameter. Smaller pieces are called cobbles and pebbles. While a boulder may be small enough to move or roll manually, others are extremely massive. In c ...

s containing

quartz Quartz is a hard, crystalline mineral composed of silica (silicon dioxide). The atoms are linked in a continuous framework of SiO4 silicon-oxygen tetrahedra, with each oxygen being shared between two tetrahedra, giving an overall chemical form ...

sandstone Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates) ...

, or conglomerate. The creek's valley is the only place in the Sweet Valley quadrangle with the exception of the valley of

North Branch Bowman Creek North Branch Bowman Creek is a tributary of Bowman Creek in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, in the United States. It is approximately long and flows through Fairmount Township and Ross Township. The watershed of the creek has an area of . The cree ...

. Further upstream in the valley, there is Wiscoinsnan Bouldery

Till image:Geschiebemergel.JPG, Closeup of glacial till. Note that the larger grains (pebbles and gravel) in the till are completely surrounded by the matrix of finer material (silt and sand), and this characteristic, known as ''matrix support'', is d ...

, more Boulder Colluvium, and a patch of Wisconsinan Till. The valley walls have surficial geology consisting of

bedrock In geology, bedrock is solid Rock (geology), rock that lies under loose material (regolith) within the crust (geology), crust of Earth or another terrestrial planet. Definition Bedrock is the solid rock that underlies looser surface mater ...

made of

and

shale Shale is a fine-grained, clastic sedimentary rock formed from mud that is a mix of flakes of clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4) and tiny fragments (silt-sized particles) of other minerals, especial ...

. In the creek's upper reaches, the surficial geology along it mainly consists of Wisconsinan Bouldery Till, Wisconsinan Till, and

s. In preglacial times, the area that is now

Lake Leigh Leigh Lake is located in Grand Teton National Park, in the U. S. state of Wyoming. The glacially formed lake is wide and long from north to south. Situated just southeast of Mount Moran, the lake is at the terminus of both Paintbrush and Leigh Ca ...

and part of

Lake Jean Lake Jean is a lake in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, Luzerne County and Sullivan County, Pennsylvania, Sullivan County, in Pennsylvania, in the United States. It has a surface area of approximately and is situated in Colley Township, Sullivan Coun ...

drained into South Branch Bowman Creek. However, glacial action caused them to become part of the watershed of Kitchen Creek. There used to be a

glacial lake A glacial lake is a body of water with origins from glacier activity. They are formed when a glacier erodes the land and then melts, filling the depression created by the glacier. Formation Near the end of the last glacial period, roughly 10,0 ...

in the valley of South Branch Bowman Creek.

Hydrology and watershed

The

watershed Watershed is a hydrological term, which has been adopted in other fields in a more or less figurative sense. It may refer to: Hydrology * Drainage divide, the line that separates neighbouring drainage basins * Drainage basin, called a "watershe ...

of South Branch Bowman Creek has an area of . The mouth of the creek is in the

United States Geological Survey The United States Geological Survey (USGS), formerly simply known as the Geological Survey, is a scientific agency of the United States government. The scientists of the USGS study the landscape of the United States, its natural resources, ...

quadrangle of Sweet Valley. However, its source is in the quadrangle of Red Rock. The mouth of the creek is located at Mountain Springs. Most of the length of South Branch Bowman Creek is in

, but its lower reaches (including Mount Springs Lake) are on land owned by the

Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission The Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission is an independent state agency responsible for the regulation of all fishing and boating in the state of Pennsylvania within the United States of America. Unlike many U.S. states, Pennsylvania has a separ ...

. Hunting is permitted along all of the creek that is in Ricketts Glen State Park, except for the headwaters area. In the 1980s, South Branch Bowman Creek was found to have high levels of

acidity In computer science, ACID ( atomicity, consistency, isolation, durability) is a set of properties of database transactions intended to guarantee data validity despite errors, power failures, and other mishaps. In the context of databases, a sequ ...

History and recreation

South Branch Bowman Creek was entered into the

Geographic Names Information System The Geographic Names Information System (GNIS) is a database of name and locative information about more than two million physical and cultural features throughout the United States and its territories, Antarctica, and the associated states of ...

on August 2, 1979. Its identifier in the Geographic Names Information System is 1188015. South Branch Bowman Creek is also known as Cherry Run. This variant name appears in a 1953 map by the United States Geological Survey. However, it was realized in 1969 that this variant name was erroneous. A

hiking trail A trail, also known as a path or track, is an unpaved lane or small road usually passing through a natural area. In the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland, a path or footpath is the preferred term for a pedestrian or hiking trail. The ...

known as the Cherry Run Trail crosses South Branch Bowman Creek in

. Another hiking trail, the Mountain Springs Trail, is also in the creek's vicinity.

Biology

The drainage basin of South Branch Bowman Creek is designated as a High-Quality Coldwater Fishery and a Migratory Fishery. Wild

trout Trout are species of freshwater fish belonging to the genera '' Oncorhynchus'', ''Salmo'' and ''Salvelinus'', all of the subfamily Salmoninae of the family Salmonidae. The word ''trout'' is also used as part of the name of some non-salmoni ...

naturally reproduce in the creek from its headwaters downstream to its mouth.

References

{{authority control Rivers of Luzerne County, Pennsylvania Tributaries of Bowman Creek Rivers of Pennsylvania