I spent my childhood in Shancai Village, on the banks of the Wei Canal in the northern part of Guantao County, Hebei Province, and during that time, the place that made me feel most mysterious and fearful was the "Old Turtle Pit" in the east of the village and inside the river embankment.
The old turtle pit is a piece of water, it is about 300 meters long from east to west, about 100 meters wide from north to south, its north is the Wei Canal embankment, the south is a protruding sand dune, there are several blue brick houses built on it at that time, and the east is a section of sand that is not too high, separating the "old turtle pit" from the Wei Canal.
Close-up view of "Old Turtle Pit".
Because the old turtle pit is far away from the village, and there are no motor vehicles on the embankment of the Wei Canal in the 70s, when you go to play around the old turtle pit, in addition to the slight sound of the wind, there are only some insects chirping in the farmland and trees, making the place seem unusually quiet.
The surface of the pit is dark green, and the color becomes darker towards the center. It is said that the center of the pit is connected to the Wei Canal by the "Sea Eye", and no matter how dry the weather is, it still has abundant, deep water. In addition, the adults scared us that there was an "old turtle" in the pit that "eats children", and all kinds of legends made me tremble a little every time I was next to it, not only wanting to escape from here quickly, but also because it had a lot of fun for me to stay.
Shancai Village and "Old Turtle Pit" on satellite images around the 70s of the last century
Before harvesting, my friends and I will "steal" some peanuts and sweet potatoes, dig an earthen stove on the ground, light the dead branches and barbecue, satisfy the appetite, and every time the face is covered with black ash.
The reeds are harvested every autumn, dried and woven into reed mats for a wide range of purposes, either for their own use or at the sharp mound in the north.
The villagers also salvage once every few years in the old turtle pit, which fully reflects the characteristics of the riverside village, almost every few families can move out of a small boat, everyone is busy for two days, harvesting a large number of various kinds of fish that cannot be named, and the brigade is distributed to each family, so that everyone can have a good satisfaction.
At this time, I often wonder if the famous "old turtle" knows whether it will be able to stop the villagers from salvaging, but this thought is just a flash.
Other local rivers form oxbow lakes that resemble "old turtle pits".
A few years later, I learned that this so-called "old turtle pit" was the remnants of a river similar to the "oxbow lake" left after the bend of the Wei Canal was cut and straightened. What "sea eye" and what "old turtle" are just legends.
Wei Canal in the Ming and Qing dynasties is the passage of Henan Province's grain into Beijing, but from the upstream of northern Henan, southern Hebei, to the downstream of Tianjin, the slope is larger, if the Wei Canal water is directly discharged, can not save the amount of water, and cause the water speed to be too rapid, not conducive to shipping. In addition, the Wei Canal is a natural river, and the river surface is wide, and it is not possible to build many sluices to regulate the water level and volume like the Huitong River to the south of Linqing. So the wise ancients came up with a way to increase the length and reduce the slope, which is to increase the number of bends in the river to increase the total length of the river. Therefore, the Wei Canal has become a river with many twists and turns. Although the distance traveled by the boat has increased, the time it can travel has increased, and the operation has been smooth, so it is generally cost-effective.
A map from around 1933 shows what the river to the east of Yamazai Village looked like before it was straightened
After the closure of the Wei Canal, the most important transportation function disappeared, and the disadvantages caused by the bending of the river channel were highlighted, and the poor flow of water was very easy to form floods, and soon after the founding of the People's Republic of China, there were two major floods in 1954 and 1956. From March 5 to June 10, 1958, the "Wei Canal and Sinu Temple River Reduction and Expansion Project Office" compiled the "Preliminary Design of the Wei Canal Expansion Project", which took measures to expand the river channel from Xu Wancang to Sinu Temple according to the design flow of 1,250 cubic meters per second.
The "Old Turtle Pit" in the river embankment in the eastern part of Shancai Village was formed at this time. It was originally an S-shaped river channel that started from the east of Qianfudu Village, went east through Weichang and Zhengchang Village, and then turned back to the east of Shancai Village, and after the bend in 1958, it became a symbol "$" similar to the dollar, and then slowly evolved.
Schematic diagram of the changes before and after the cutting and straightening of the east river channel in Shancai Village
In nature, the "oxbow lake" is a lake formed by the old river channel left behind by the natural bending and straightening of the meandering river due to the change or diversion of the river. The formation of the "Old Turtle Pit" is nothing more than changing the process of change from natural to artificial, and it is the same thing as the "Oxbow Lake".
The formation process of oxbow lakes in nature
Today, there is no time to visit the old turtle pit anymore, only to look at it silently from the perspective of "God" through the satellite map, it still has a turquoise water, like an emerald inlaid between the village and the Wei Canal.