‘Dam’-olition begins at Lake Conway 

MAYFLOWER — Contractors with the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission last week began removing old infrastructure at Lake Conway Dam to make room for a new water-control system and weir as part of the scheduled Lake Conway renovation project.

The previous dam, built in 1948, was operated with metal gates that required manual operation to raise or lower water levels. Over 75 years, the infrastructure was in need of replacement, so the AGFC saw the perfect opportunity for a lake-wide reset. The new water-control system will be a concrete labyrinth weir that will maintain a single water level throughout the lake as water passes over it. According to Reid Phifer, assistant chief of operations for the AGFC, the design of the weir will allow as much water as a traditional 600-foot wide spillway, but fit within the footprint of the existing dam structure.

“We’ve gated off access during the construction for safety, and contractors have built a turnaround there,” Reid Phifer, assistant chief of operations at the AGFC, said. “Contractors have already torn out the old log-catcher in front of the old dam and are putting in the coffer dam this week.”

The coffer dam will enable crews to continue to work despite rising water levels, to a point.

“It’s just like every other job we build in a hole; it’s susceptible to water,” Phifer said. “It’s a coffer dam, so it’s not meant to hold back a 20-year flood, but it will keep them going unless we have a significant rain event. We’re in really good shape and we’re pleased with the contractor doing the job.”

Mobley Contractors out of Morrilton is doing the work, and Phifer is confident the project is still well within the initial 5-year timeline.

“We’ll need two good dry summers to complete the work, but even then, we’re still a year ahead of the first estimated completion date, ” Phifer said. “And a lot of other work can be going on while the dam is being rebuilt.”

Phifer says he’s confident that the public will maintain the same sort of access they’ve always enjoyed once the work is complete.

“We know there are people who have enjoyed access to a part of Bell Slough Wildlife Management Area by the old dam, and we’re already planning how to maintain and even increase that access once we’re finished with the construction,” Phifer said. “We’ve got a good plan and a good contractor, so I’m pretty excited.”

Nick Feltz, AGFC fisheries supervisor in Mayflower, said fisheries staff recently mobilized to complete another habitat project on the lakebed in Palarm and Pierce Creeks, Gold Lake, Paradise Landing and the dam area.

“Staff gathered together to build 148 wood ‘lean-to’ structures in early October,” Feltz said. “We had about 20 staff members help out over four days. We actually ran out of materials we’d gathered for the project and cut the build short by one day, but we plan to have more in the next few months when we can gather more supplies.”

Adding wood structures to a lake like Conway may seem redundant in the quagmire of stumps littering the lakebed,  but Feltz explains that not all stumps are created equal.

“You obviously have some stumps that are great, with gnarly roots and cavities to provide good cover, but you also have a lot of stumps that are just a simple vertical stick in the mud,” Feltz said. “These ‘lean-to’ builds offer more horizontal cover that fish can get underneath and use as shelter or ambush points. We’ve also seen where these structures catch some of the floating debris and become even better by becoming larger and more complex. As some of the debris floats around after the lake is refilled, some of these structures will become fantastic brush piles.”

Feltz also pointed out that the gravel spawning site projects are rolling full steam ahead, with much of the most recent work being done by dedicated landowners who want to create spawning habitat near their shoreline or boat houses. The AGFC has created hundreds of concrete disks that can be filled with gravel to offer ideal spawning beds for bream and bass.

“These fish need a hard bottom to spawn, and the silt buildup in the lake wasn’t allowing fish reproduction to reach its potential,” Feltz said. “We got the idea of the spawning disks from a person in New Mexico who is heavily involved in habitat enhancement on public reservoirs. We just needed to increase the scale of the project to benefit a lake as large as Conway, and it was a perfect opportunity to get landowners involved.”

Feltz says the spawning disks have been very popular with anglers, with hundreds of lakeside landowners registering to reserve their portion. Each person is limited to 30 spawning disks, and they are going quickly.

“We know there are a few people who signed up who may not be able to get their disks, but we can’t hold them back if someone else who’s registered shows up,” he said. “But we’ll be pouring more as soon as we can work out the logistics. We poured 800 disks in the first round and our partnership with SRM Concrete has up to 1,200 more disks worth of donated concrete to use; it’s a matter of finding the time and manpower to get those done.”

Feltz says SRM Concrete has worked with other states to create fish habitat, and they have been excellent partners in this project as well.

The lake renovation has already reached a few major milestones along its path to recovery. Earlier this year, contractors completed mulching more than 29 miles of boat lanes through the sunken forests of “Old Stumpy” to greatly increase the safety of boaters visiting the lake.

“Those lanes were a major accomplishment and one area where we were really able to work hand-in-hand with the public to plan the best outcome,” Feltz said. “As the lake level rises, we’ll be able to mark all those lanes with wooden utility poles that will be easy to see.”

Feltz also points to the massive amount of natural regeneration taking place on the lakebed as future complex cover for bass and other sport fish.

“We’re seeing cypress and other water-tolerant trees up to 5 feet tall in some places. If we even get one one-hundredth of those trees to survive post-flood, it would mean a lot to Lake Conway. The areas where live cypress remained were historically the most productive, so expanding that live tree component could really help the fishery in the long-term.”

The project also grabbed many people’s attention when the AGFC used helicopters to haul hundreds of tons of gravel to various spots on the lakebed to increase spawning success. “The gravel will help bream and other sunfish spawn successfully, instead of their eggs being covered by silt,” Feltz said. “We also airlifted a bunch of concrete culverts that make excellent spawning habitat and ambush cover for catfish.”

Be sure to keep up with all the latest developments in the Lake Conway renovation at www.agfc.com/lakeconway.

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CUTLINES:

DUMP TRUCK
Lake Conway Dam Road will be closed during construction of the new dam and water-control structure. AGFC photo by Mike Wintroath.

RUBBLE
Mobley Contractors out of Morrilton has already removed the old log catcher and debris fence that was in front of the old gate system. AGFC photo courtesy Mobley Contractors.

CREEK
A coffer dam will hold back small to moderate rainfalls for workers to continue construction. AGFC photo courtesy Mobley Contractors.

DISK
The AGFC is working with lakeside landowners and anglers to distribute 800 concrete spawning disks and has plans to create 1,200 more as time allows. AGFC photo.