Chelan County, Washington
Excavation in Cashmere, WA
Cashmere, Monitor and Dryden sit on the Wenatchee River bottom. Bedrock is a hundred feet down, so the digging problems come from what the river and the floods left on top of it.
Core sample
What’s under Cashmere
- 1Flood silt and sandMixed into the gravel around Dryden
- 2Gravel 20 to 65 percentPlus stone up to 20 percent
- 3Valley fill 100 to 250 ftBedrock is a long way down
- Frost depth 24 inFootings and water lines go below it
Illustration based on the ground notes for Cashmere, Monitor and Dryden. Not to scale and not a soil test.
Working ground in Cashmere
What the ground is like
- Valley fill through here runs 100 to 250 feet deep. On the flat, the hard part is what’s in the fill.
- The lower layers in Peshastin type ground carry 20 to 65 percent gravel and up to 20 percent stone. A chain trencher stalls in that. A hoe doesn’t.
- The orchard benches above town are a different job. Weathered granitic rock turns up at 10 to 20 inches, so a footing that was easy on the flat becomes rock work up the hill.
- Around Dryden there are flood silt beds mixed into the gravel. Two holes on the same parcel can behave nothing alike.
- The Highline Canal runs 34 miles from Dryden to Rock Island. Canal easements get called in separately from an 811 ticket, and unauthorized work inside one comes out at your expense.
Permits in Cashmere
Inside city limits the City of Cashmere handles permits. Monitor, Dryden and the benches go through Chelan County Community Development, and irrigation district easements are their own phone call.
Backcountry Excavation LLC is a registered Washington contractor, licensed, bonded and insured. You can check all of it before you hire us.
Services in Cashmere
What we do in Cashmere
Site Preparation in Cashmere
Raw ground turned into a pad you can build on: cleared, stripped, cut to grade and compacted.
See the detailExcavation and Earthwork in Cashmere
Digging, moving and placing dirt. Foundation holes, bulk earthwork, backfill and haul off.
See the detailGrading and Drainage in Cashmere
Shaping ground so water leaves the property the way it should, instead of sitting against a building.
See the detailLand Clearing in Cashmere
Overgrown or wooded ground opened up. Brush, stumps, slash and debris out, site left workable.
See the detailDriveways and Access Roads in Cashmere
Gravel driveways and access roads built or rebuilt to hold up to weather, grade and loaded trucks.
See the detailUtility Trenching in Cashmere
Trenching and backfill for water, power and other underground lines, dug to depth and bedded properly.
See the detailFoundation Excavation in Cashmere
Foundation holes, footings and cutting to concrete grade, ready for the concrete crew.
See the detailStorm Drainage Systems in Cashmere
Catch basins, storm pipe, culverts and drywells that carry storm water off the property.
See the detailRetaining Walls in Cashmere
Vertical block and large retaining walls that hold a grade change where dirt alone won’t.
See the detailAsphalt Prep in Cashmere
Subgrade cut, base rock placed and compacted, grades held so the paving crew can do their job.
See the detailDemolition in Cashmere
Structures, slabs and hardscape taken down, material hauled off and the ground left clean.
See the detailEmergency work in Cashmere
Washouts, broken lines, plugged culverts and storm damage. Call or text the owners.
What to do right nowSomething else in Cashmere?
Most jobs are a combination. Describe what you want to end up with and we’ll work out the pieces.
Tell us about the jobQuestions
Cashmere questions
Do you dig on the orchard benches above Cashmere?
Yes. Rock shows up shallow on that ground, often inside two feet. We look at the access and the first foot of ground before we quote.
What about the irrigation district lines?
We locate before we dig, and canal easements get called in separately from 811. It costs a phone call and it saves a very expensive mistake.
Nearby
Other ground we work
Chelan County
Wenatchee, WA
Wenatchee mixes town lots with orchard and acreage on the edges, and the two need very different approaches on the ground.
See the groundChelan County
Leavenworth, WA
Leavenworth, Peshastin, Plain and Lake Wenatchee sit on some of the deepest loose ground in the state. The boulders mixed through it are what make jobs there hard.
See the groundChelan County
Chelan, WA
Chelan is home. It’s also where a lot of the hardest ground in the valley is, and most of what makes a job here difficult shows up before the first bucket of dirt moves.
See the groundWhat our machine fits through · How an estimate works · Permits and locates
Call or text the owners
Got a job in Cashmere?
Tell us where the site is and what you’re trying to get done. We’ll let you know whether we can take it on and roughly when.
(509) 421-1539