Today, a picture taken a little upstream shows considerable recovery (a wet year always helps!) with more native grasses, forbs, and sedges moving in, and emergent aquatic vegetation (mostly water willow) covering the bottom of the gully. The gully is wider, with "stepped" sides from slump.
The gully extends on upstream, as a series of pools in a shallow curve to the right, but more and more it's becoming a seasonal wetland, attractive to those species that like a sunny, open habitat.
In contrast to this "open" aquatic habitat, the main creek's western tributary, which we call Westbrook, is in a a narrow band of woods for its entire length on our property. Sometime in the past, it carved a deep gully, but now that's all wooded, and the creek itself is shallow, with vegetation up to the margin. It's only seasonal, but when it has water, it's particularly beautiful.
Since we made the rock crossing for trucks and the tractor, this porous "dam" has held water in the upper Westbrook longer--and that's very popular with the birds and other wildlife that prefer a secluded place to drink and bathe.