“R” is for Rice trunks. Rice trunks are wooden sluices installed in “banks” or dikes of rice fields for irrigation and flood control. They are long, narrow, wooden boxes with a door at each end. Hung on uprights, the swinging doors, called gates, may be raised or lowered to drain or flood a field. When the gate on the river end of a trunk is raised, the water in the field runs into the river at low tide. As the tide turns, the rising water exerts pressure on the river gate and swings it tightly shut, preventing water from returning to the field. To flood the field, the process is reversed. The rice trunk was an incredibly ingenious, yet simple apparatus that made large-scale planting and irrigation control possible in the South Carolina lowcountry.
“R” is for Rice trunks
