Tomhicken Creek (also known as Tomhickon Creek) is a stream in

Luzerne County 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 ...

and Schuylkill County, in

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

, in the United States. It is approximately long and is the largest tributary of

Catawissa Creek Catawissa Creek (colloquially known as The Cat) is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed August 8, 2011 tributary of the Susquehanna River in east-central Pennsylvania in t ...

. Named tributaries of the creek include Little Crooked Run, Little Tomhicken Creek, Raccoon Creek, and Sugarloaf Creek. The watershed of the main stem has an area of 20.6 square miles. A number of mine tunnels discharge into the creek and its tributaries.

Course

The headwaters of Tomhicken Creek are inside a

deep mine This list of deepest mines includes operational and non-operational mines that are at least , which is the depth of Veryovkina Cave, the deepest known natural cave in the world. The depth measurements in this list represent the difference in ele ...

. Tomhicken Creek begins in southwestern Hazle Township, Luzerne County immediately west of an area of

strip mine Surface mining, including strip mining, open-pit mining and mountaintop removal mining, is a broad category of mining in which soil and rock overlying the mineral deposit (the overburden) are removed, in contrast to underground mining, in whic ...

s and north of Pismire Ridge. It flows west-southwest, roughly paralleling Pennsylvania Route 924 and shortly leaves Hazle Township and Luzerne County. Upon leaving Luzerne County, the creek enters East Union Township, in Schuylkill County. It crosses Pennsylvania Route 924 and flows immediately north of another area of strip mines before turning northwest to flow off Green Mountain and entering North Union Township. It receives Sugarloaf Creek in the eastern reaches of the township and shortly afterwards passes the community of Miller's Corner. At Miller's Corner, Tomhicken Creek turns southwest and then north, receiving Raccoon Creek. The creek then turns southwest again and

meander A meander is one of a series of regular sinuous curves in the channel of a river or other watercourse. It is produced as a watercourse erodes the sediments of an outer, concave bank ( cut bank) and deposits sediments on an inner, convex ba ...

s several times south of Red Ridge before reaching its confluence with Catawissa Creek near the community of Zion Grove.

Tributaries

Tomhicken Creek's tributaries include Sugarloaf Creek, Little Tomhicken Creek, and Raccoon Creek. Raccoon Creek is approximately long and flows west from Black Creek Township, Luzerne County into North Union Township, Schuylkill County, where it joins Tommhicken Creek. Little Tomhicken Creek is approximately long and flows southwest to join Tomhicken Creek in East Union Township. Sugarloaf Creek is approximately long and flows from Hazle Township, Luzerne County to North Union Township, where it joins the main stem. Other tributaries include Little Crooked Run and "Trib 27568 to Tomhicken Creek".

Hydrology

Little Tomhicken Creek contributes

acid mine drainage Acid mine drainage, acid and metalliferous drainage (AMD), or acid rock drainage (ARD) is the outflow of acidic water from metal mines or coal mines. Acid rock drainage occurs naturally within some environments as part of the rock weathering ...

to Tomhicken Creek. There are also high concentrations of nutrients in the creek. Upstream of Little Tomhicken Creek, Sugarloaf Creek, and the Oneida No. 3 Tunnel, the

iron Iron () is a chemical element with Symbol (chemistry), symbol Fe (from la, Wikt:ferrum, ferrum) and atomic number 26. It is a metal that belongs to the first transition series and group 8 element, group 8 of the periodic table. It is, Abundanc ...

concentration is 0.5 milligrams per liter. The daily load is . The

manganese Manganese is a chemical element with the symbol Mn and atomic number 25. It is a hard, brittle, silvery metal, often found in minerals in combination with iron. Manganese is a transition metal with a multifaceted array of industrial alloy use ...

concentration is 0.08 milligrams per liter, equating to a daily load of . The concentration of

aluminum Aluminium (aluminum in American and Canadian English) is a chemical element with the symbol Al and atomic number 13. Aluminium has a density lower than those of other common metals, at approximately one third that of steel. It ha ...

is 0.69 milligrams per liter, so the daily load is . The concentrations 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 ...

and

alkalinity Alkalinity (from ar, القلوي, al-qaly, lit=ashes of the saltwort) is the capacity of water to resist acidification. It should not be confused with basicity, which is an absolute measurement on the pH scale. Alkalinity is the strength ...

are 0.83 and 23.37 milligrams per liter respectively and the loads are per day and per day. The concentration of

sulfate The sulfate or sulphate ion is a polyatomic anion with the empirical formula . Salts, acid derivatives, and peroxides of sulfate are widely used in industry. Sulfates occur widely in everyday life. Sulfates are salts of sulfuric acid and many ...

s ranges from 10 to 65 milligrams per liter with an average of 25.69 milligrams per liter. At the mouth of Tomhicken Creek, the concentration of iron is 0.15 milligrams per liter. The daily load is . The manganese concentration is 0.17 milligrams per liter, equating to a daily load of . The concentration of aluminum is 0.42 milligrams per liter, so the daily load is . The concentration of acidity is 10.92 milligrams per liter and the concentration of alkalinity is 6.04 milligrams per liter. The daily load of acidity is and the load of alkalinity is . the minimum sulfate concentration is 21 milligrams per liter, the average concentration is 30.04 milligrams per liter, and the maximum concentration is 49 milligrams per liter. The pH of Tomhicken Creek upstream of Little Tomhicken Creek, Sugarloaf Creek, and the Oneida No. 3 Tunnel ranges from 5.6 to 7.2 with an average of 6.52. At the mouth, the pH ranges from 5.8 to 6.2 with an average of 6.0. Before 1997, much of the lower reaches of the creek had a pH from 4.0 to 4.9. The discharge of Tomhicken Creek near its headwaters is 10,681 gallons per minute. Near Zion Grove, the discharge is 10,687.5 gallons per minute.

Geology

The Oneida No. 3 Tunnel empties into Tomhicken Creek downstream of the mouth of Little Tomhicken Creek. The Oneida No. 1 Tunnel discharges into the tributary Sugarloaf Creek. Little Sugarloaf Mountain is located between Tomhicken Creek and Little Tomhicken Creek. There is a small and narrow basin of

coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal is formed when ...

in the watershed of Tomhicken Creek. The

Mauch Chunk Formation The Mississippian Mauch Chunk Formation is a mapped bedrock unit in Pennsylvania, Maryland, and West Virginia. It is named for the township of Mauch Chunk, now known as borough of Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania and for nearby Mauch Chunk Ridge where th ...

is found near the confluence of the creek with Catawissa Creek and much of the rest of the Tomhicken Creek watershed. However, some of the upper reaches of the watershed are occupied by the

Hamilton Group The Hamilton Group is a Devonian-age geological group in the Appalachian region of the United States. It is present in New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Ohio, West Virginia, northwestern Virginia and Ontario, Canada. It is mainly composed of mar ...

. The soils in the watershed include the Leck Kill soil in the lower reaches and the Hazleton Soil in the upper reaches. There are deep valleys north and south of the Tomhicken Creek basin due to

erosion Erosion is the action of surface processes (such as water flow or wind) that removes soil, rock, or dissolved material from one location on the Earth's crust, and then transports it to another location where it is deposited. Erosion is dis ...

Watershed

The watershed of Tomhicken Creek has an area of 20.6 square miles. The creek is the largest tributary of

. The watershed is not far from the headwaters of Black Creek at Little Sugarloaf Mountain. The Tomhicken Creek watershed does not border any other major sub-watersheds of Catawissa Creek. The Eagle Rock Resort is located in the upper reaches of the Tomhicken Creek. It consists mostly of second homes or

retirement home A retirement home – sometimes called an old people's home or old age home, although ''old people's home'' can also refer to a nursing home – is a multi-residence housing facility intended for the elderly. Typically, each person or couple in ...

History and recreation

Gristmill A gristmill (also: grist mill, corn mill, flour mill, feed mill or feedmill) grinds cereal grain into flour and middlings. The term can refer to either the grinding mechanism or the building that holds it. Grist is grain that has been separat ...

s and other types of

mills Mills is the plural form of mill, but may also refer to: As a name * Mills (surname), a common family name of English or Gaelic origin * Mills (given name) *Mills, a fictional British secret agent in a trilogy by writer Manning O'Brine Places Uni ...

were built on the creek some time before 1901. The Red Ridge Road bridge over Tomhicken Creek was built in 1937. A nine-ton weight restriction was placed on it in 2010. A number of large private campgrounds have been established along the creek.

Biology

Tomhicken Creek is a coldwater fishery. Little Tomhicken Creek was studied 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 sepa ...

in 1997 and found to be completely devoid of fish. This has later been found to inaccurate. Tomhicken Creek was found to be teeming with life such as the

Bluntnose minnow :''"Bluntnose minnows" is also used for the genus '' Pimephales'' as a whole.'' The bluntnose minnow (''Pimephales notatus)'' is a species of temperate freshwater fish belonging to the genus '' Pimephales'' of the cyprinid family. Its natural geog ...

, Brook trout, Brown Trout, digger crayfish and multiple species of turtles. The tributary Raccoon Creek is classified as a high-quality coldwater fishery. There are four species of fish in the upper reaches of Tomhicken Creek and five species of fish between two sites in the lower reaches. A large population of brook trout, as well as several other fish species, inhabit the tributary Raccoon Creek. There is also a significant population of brook trout in the tributary Little Crooked Run. In 1905, 700 rainbow trout were observed in Tomhicken Creek and Little Tomhicken Creek. Significant numbers of '' Allocapnia'' and '' Taeniopteryx'' were observed on Tomhicken Creek near Zion Grove in 2003. ''

Sweltsa ''Sweltsa'' is a genus of green stoneflies in the family Chloroperlidae Chloroperlidae are a family of stoneflies, commonly known as green stoneflies, with more than 200 species and 22 genera. They appear green to yellow in colour, and are p ...

'' have also been observed in the creek.

References

External links

INFLUENCE OF THE ONEIDA #3 MINE TUNNEL DRAINAGE ON LITTLE TOMHICKEN CREEK BEFORE AND AFTER THE REPAIR OF AN AMD PASSIVE TREATMENT SYSTEM
{{authority control Rivers of Luzerne County, Pennsylvania Rivers of Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania Tributaries of the Susquehanna River Rivers of Pennsylvania