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Picture of the day -
October 29,2006
"Rock Spring"
Photo courtesy of Jim Thias.
For me, "springs" are among the most interesting of all
of God's creations. While I fully understand the physical forces of
nature that cause them to exist, it still amazes me whenever I see
water flowing out of the ground, seemingly from nowhere. The earth's
crust has numerous streams and rivers flowing beneath its surface,
and when one of them breaks out into the open we have a spring!
When I was growing up in rural Widener Valley, Virginia, we got our
water from a spring located high on a nearby mountain ridge. A 1/2
inch plastic pipe carried the water from the spring down the side of
the mountain and into a large concrete tank located on top of a tall
hill near our house. This "reservoir" drained into several other
plastic pipes that carried the water into our home and the homes of
several of my "kinfolk".
This method of acquiring much-needed water wasn't quite on the scale
of the Roman aqueducts, but the principle was pretty much the same.
You simply find a water source (usually a spring) on a high plot of
ground, then put in place something to carry the water downhill
under force of gravity. It worked for the ancient Romans for the
better part of two millennia, and it worked for my family for
several decades before "the county" installed a municipal water
system through the valley a few years back.
About the photo: Today's picture was taken by photographer Jim
Thias. He included this very interesting story when he submitted the
picture:
"This was taken on a wet fall afternoon about 25 miles west of
Grand Rapids, MI, on a hill that divided a large corn field and some
swampy woods. As I climbed the hill past the spring, I expected to
see at least a small pond, but when I reached the top, about 20
yards or so past the flowing water, I stood at the edge of a vast
corn field.
"This is the first spring I've ever come across that was
on the side of a hill, and most interesting to me was the fact that
its source existed under a corn field. It was a very serene setting
with just the sound of a light wind blowing through the trees and
that of trickling water." |
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