five fingers

D

deltabighat

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Hal Schell used to talk about the "five fingers" or "five bedrooms" anchorages down around Mandeville somewhere in one of his early books. I cannot find it on any of my maps....anyone know where these are and are they still there?

DBH
 
They are still there, although, if you are planning a visit I would advise high tide as the egeria is quite bad there. It is fairly easy find, especially if you have google earth. The name describes it to a tee
 
Use Google earth and look at:
38 0.5' N by 121 30.8' W

Like pkjryan said, the weeds have ruined it. Years ago it was a very popular spot, it was like anchoring in a slip! A little privacy, protection on all sides.

Rod
 
Yup, that's the one! I think only bass boats can get in there now.....I remember a group of beaver enjoying dinner one evening while I was anchored there. At that time big boats could no longer get into it. I haven't been back since, but as I've gone by I have seen boats anchored there. The great thing was that you were protected from winds, wakes and strong currents in one nice location....
 
When you are that link, click on the area of water just north of Mildred and east of Mandeville. you will easily spot the five fingers using the zoom feature.
 
One day hopefully we can make a treatment there. Definitely on my shortlist as a I would love to see it used again
 
I have an old Delta book called "Cruising the California Delta" by Bob Walters. It pre-dates Hal Schell's books I believe. Very good book with great pictures and in that he also talks of the Five Fingers and what a unique place to hang on the hook. Its fun to see some of my favorite delta places and how they looked almost forty years ago.

DBH
 
Most of the Delta is barely recognizable today when compared to forty years ago! For anyone who has moved away, cherish your memories, because it will never be like that again!!!!
 
Does anybody know why five fingers was created? It took a good deal of dredging to get that done, and I wonder who spent the money and why?

BTG
 
I think that I read in one of my books about the delta that when they were dredging the SJ to take out some of the bends and make it a straighter and safer river, they dumped the dredging material anywhere they could and they created some man made islands and berms off the main river. I think I will check on that to see if I am correct.

DBH
 
According to Hal's books, nobody knows for sure why the fingers were dredged. One rumor is that somebody practicing to use a dredge and another was that somebody did it with the hopes of charging for use.

Somebody on boatingabc.com claimed to have anchored a houseboat in there late last summer and said it wasn't choked with weeds. He wasn't a local though, and I wonder if he was confused about his location, but he seemed to know the area pretty well and said it wasn't usable the year before. The last time I stopped to take a look I quickly turned around. The egeria was really thick.
 
One early book I have on the delta offers a couple explanations. One prominent, but unproveable, theory is that the five little harbors or fingers were dredged to hide barges that were bringing illegal chinese laborers from San Francisco in to work the levee system. The other is that the rich peat in this area was dredged out and transferred and used to make levee construction. I am going to dig deeper on this question. It fascinates me.

DBH
 
quote:
Originally posted by deltabighat

One early book I have on the delta offers a couple explanations. One prominent, but unproveable, theory is that the five little harbors or fingers were dredged to hide barges that were bringing illegal chinese laborers from San Francisco in to work the levee system. The other is that the rich peat in this area was dredged out and transferred and used to make levee construction. I am going to dig deeper on this question. It fascinates me.

DBH

Click to expand...
My theory is that they were dug out not to hide barges but to moor barges which served as floating barracks for the workers. Since there was very little solid ground at the time to build any structures in that area, this would make sense.
 
What I heard:

Before interstates and 18 wheel trucks barges were used to haul produce from the farm fields to market, typically San Francisco. They needed someplace to store the barges, and this was the spot.
 
quote:
Originally posted by abdiver

What I heard:

Before interstates and 18 wheel trucks barges were used to haul produce from the farm fields to market, typically San Francisco. They needed someplace to store the barges, and this was the spot.

Click to expand...
Whether it was for people or produce, my guess is that they were dug out to store barges for some reason. kind of curious as to when they were dug out, though. And who owns it?
 
A little research in Hal Schell's early book on the delta states that there were a lot of theorys about why the fingers were dredged. He firmly states that he found out that an early farmer with too much time on his hands and an idle dredger carved out those spots in the hopes of renting them out to boat clubs or fisherman and thereby turning some worthless ground into some sort of money making venture. Since I consider him to be the Emperor of the Delta, I will abide by his opinion. I have to get up that way my next trip and see whats there now.

DBH
 
I doubt the story that these were dredged to use peat as levee filler. Up until the sixties, peat was harvested to be dried and sold to garden supply houses. It is great top soil! I would expect someone harvested peat there and sold it.
 
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