Unit six

FLUVIAL PROCESSES AND LANDFORMS

by: Dr. Eng. Eka Oktariyanto N

 Introduction
 Running water present in almost all
environments, at least occasionally but
other agents are limited to small parts of
the continents (action of wind, waves
and currents) or glacial ice.
 Nearly every part of the Earth has seen, at
sometime in it’s geologic past, the imprint
of fluvial processes.
 In this paper we will discussed about the
various types of erosion, features of
drainage basin and types of drainage
pattern geomorphic works of rivers:
erosion, transportation and deposition, the
development of river valley, the stages of
river and various land forms associated
with these courses.
 Learning objectives
 By the end of this unit you will be able to:
 Explain briefly the various forms of surface and
cannel erosion
 Describe the features of a drainage basin.
 Explain how drainage patterns within a drainage
basin form.
 Explain the factors that control the processes of
river erosion,
transportation, and deposition.
 Describe channel patterns and explain its role in
stream flow.
 Describe the processes and feature formed from
fluvial processes.
 Compare and contrast the several types of deltas.
fluvial refers to the action that
created the deposit. Alluvial
refers to the deposit itself
 WATER AS AN AGENT OF
DEGRADATION
 Of the of other agents of erosion, Running
water (moving water), aides by mass
wasting, is the most important geologic
agent in eroding transporting and depositing
sediment.
 Almost every landscape on the earth shows
the result of stream erosion or deposition.
 Water erosion is a two-part process involving
the detachment and transport of weathered
materials.
 Erosion from water typically
 Surface occurs in the
erosion
following ways. Channel erosion
 1. Surface Erosion
 Water moving on the surface without being
confined to a channel. The two forms are :
splash and sheet erosion.

A. Splash Erosion
 First step in the erosion process
 Raindrops typically fall with a velocity of
20-30 feet per second.
 Disaggregating and displacement of wet
surface soil creating small craters in bare
soil.
 Energy of these impacts is sufficient to
displace soil particles as high as two feet
vertically
splash erosion Cont…
 B. Sheet Erosion
 Gradual removal of a uniform layer of soil
from the surface
 Entrainment of loose particles in overland
flow
 Overland flow on smooth slopes is laminar
(layered), so particles can only be displaced
but not suspended
 Difficult to detect its effect until it develops
into rill erosion
 The potential for sheet erosion is dependent
on the soil type, velocity, vegetation, gradient
and volume of flow over the surface.
 Long slopes, steep slopes, and slopes that
carry higher volumes of runoff are more
Sheet Erosion
 2. Channel Erosion

 Water is confined to long trough-like

depressions called channel
A. Rill Erosion

 The first stage of channel erosion and

intermediate process between sheet and
gully erosion
 Are many closely spaced, innumerable and
small shallow channels eroded by threads of
turbulent flow
Rill Erosion
 B. Gully Erosion
 Larger versions of rills
 Most gullies extend up slope as a result of headwall
migration.
 It is the collapse and slumping of the sidewalls,
which usually contributes the greatest proportion of
soil loss.

A
 C. Stream Erosion
 Eventually gullies develop into streams.
 Streams/Rivers contain more water and
have more capacity to do the work of
erosion, transportation and deposition.
 Stream channel erosion consists of both
streambed and stream bank erosion.
 In this paper the words stream and river are
used interchangeably.
·
Forms erosion on an exposed slope
 River as a System
Drainage/ River/ Basins
 River is anybody of fresh water flowing from an
upland source to a large lake or to the sea, fed by
such sources as springs and tributary streams.
 A river starts on hillsides as small channels, or rills.
 The rills combine to make larger channels or
tributaries that eventually come together, forming
distinct streams.
 The largest channels formed by this convergence of
tributaries are rivers, and they can carry large
quantities of fresh water and sediment across
continents.
 Cont’d
The world’s longest rivers
River name Continent Total length
Nile Africa 6695 Km
Amazon South America 6400 Km
Yangtze Asia 6300 Km
Mississippi-Missouri-Red Rock North America 5970 Km
Yeisey-Angara Asia 5550 Km
Yellow River Asia 5464 Km
Ob’-Irtysh Asia 5410 Km
Rio Parana-ril grande South America 4500 Km
Amur-shilka Asia 4416 Km
Lena Asia 4400 Km
Congo Africa 4374 Km
Mackenzie-Peace-Finlay North America 4241 Km
Mekong Asia 4200 Km
 Cont’d
 Rivers have different sources.
 They may start from the melt waters of
glaciers, e.g. Rhone (France), lakes, e.g. Nile
(Africa), springs, e.g. Thames (England) from
regions of steady rainfall, e.g. Zaire (Africa).

 Likewise, they may end at in the sea, e.g.

Amazon (Atlantic), the Niger (Gulf of Guinea)
and the Indus, (Arabian Sea). Sometimes the
mouth could be in a lake, e.g. Volga
(Caspian), or in a swamp, e.g. Chari River
(Lake Chad).
 Moves from its sources to its mouth captures
several tributaries.
 Cont’d

Sources of Stream Flow

 Cont’d
 Geologists have devoted much time and effort to the
study of drainage systems and their evolution. The
reasons for their interests are:
 Firstly, there is the obvious point that a drainage
system is a major feature of the physical landscape.
 Secondly, evolutionary studies of drainage systems
may afford valuable information about the
denudational history of an area. For instance, it is
often useful to attempt a reconstruction of the
initial form of a river system in order to gain
evidences of the nature and mode of origin of the
land surface on which that system began its
existence.
 Cont’d
 A drainage basin is a portion of the Earth's surface that
contains a main stream and its tributaries.
 Drainage divide- a ridge or strip of high ground
dividing one drainage basin from another.
 It determines into which basin precipitation flows. The
upland between tributaries is called interfluves.
 Cont’d
Mississippi river basin
 Cont’d

Continental
divide

North America drainage system

 Cont’d
 Streams within the drainage basin are
either perennial or intermittent in flow.
 Perennial streams -permanent streams
that flow all year.
 Intermittent stream — a stream that
carries water only part of the year.
 Tributary streams- small streams that
enter into the main stream. Some
streams are classified as exotic streams,
originate in a humid region but flow
through an arid region. E.g.. Nile and
Colorado Rivers
 Cont’d
Superposed Streams

Development of Folded
water gap Units
 Stream ordering
system
•First order streams The
smallest streams in a drainage
network have no tributary
streams.
•Second order Two first order
streams unite to form a
second order stream.
•Third order -only have
second and first order streams
as tributaries, etc.
•The main stream is always
the highest order in the basin
 Cont’d
 Drainage density is the total length of
streams per unit area.
 Drainage Density = total river length
Basin area
 There are three different drainage densities.
These are:
- Low drainage densities
- Medium Drainage densities
- High Drainage densities
 Cont’d
 Drainage Patterns - arrangement of streams
in a watershed
 Often controlled by geology structures and
surface materials
 Reflects the particular plan or design which
individual river courses collectively form.
 The most common patterns dendritic,
parallel, trellis, rectangular, radial, centripetal
and deranged or contorted.
 Cont’d
 Dendritic Pattern_ Is the most common form
and looks like the branching pattern of tree
roots.
 Develops in regions underlain by
homogeneous material horizontal sediments
or uniformly resistant rocks
 Cont’d
 Parallel Pattern_ develops in regions of
parallel, elongate landforms like outcropping
resistant rock bands.
 Sometimes indicates the presence of a major
fault that cuts across an area of steeply folded
bedrock.
 Cont’d
 Trellis drainage pattern_ develops in folded
topography like that found in the
Appalachian Mountains
 Tributary streams enter the main channel at
sharp angles as they run down sides of
parallel ridges called anticlines.
 Cont’d
 Rectangular pattern found in regions that
have undergone faulting.
 Movement of the surface due to faulting
offsets the direction of the stream; As a
result the tributary streams make shape
bends &enter the main stream at high angles.
Cont’d

 Radial pattern -develops

around a central elevated
Point
 Conically shaped
features like volcanoes
&domes
 Cont’d
 Centripetal pattern: the opposite of the
radial pattern
 Streams flow toward a central depression.
 This pattern is typical in the western and
southwestern portions of the United States
where basins exhibit interior drainage.
 During wetter portions of the year, these
streams feed ephemeral lakes, which
evaporate away during dry periods.
Cont’d
 Cont’d
 Derangeddrainage : areas recently disturbed
by events like glacial activity or volcanic
deposition; many lake and wetland, short
streams with few tributaries.
 Cont’d
 The patterns described above are accordant
or correlated with the structure and relief
over which they flow.
 Those streams that are discordant with the
rocks over which they flow are either
antecedent or superimposed.
 Antecedent streams flowed across bedrock
structures prior to uplift.
 E.g. Columbia River that cuts across the
Cascade Mountains.
 superimposed streams often not controlled
by underlying structure because river course
established according to structure of
overlying strata.
 Channel pattern
 Is the configuration of the individual stream
channel as viewed from the air.
1.Straight Channels
 Controlled by a linear zone of weakness in
the underlying rock, like a fault or joint
system.
 Straight channel does not mean a straight
flow.
 Velocity is highest in the zone overlying the
deepest part of the stream. In these areas,
sediment is transported readily resulting in
pools.
 Sediments are deposited to form bars where
the velocity of the stream is low.
 Cont’d
2.Meandering pattern
 Usually on flat land with unhurried flow with
enough force to erode banks
 Geoscientists use the sinuosity ratio to determine
whether a channel is straight or meandering.
 Sinuosity ratio is the distance between two points on
the stream measured along the channel divided by
the straight line distance between the two points.
 If the sinuosity ratio is 1.5 or greater the channel is
considered to be a meandering one.
 Lateral (sideways) erosion of the river channel
results in the river forming a winding pattern.
 Cont’d
 Erosion on outside banks, deposition on
inside banks, causing rapid and sometimes
abrupt changes in the channel.
 Cont’d
3.Braided Channels

 A network of small channel separated by small and

often
temporary islands and bars

 A stream that consists of a multiplicity of interwoven

and
interconnected shallow channels separated by low
islands of sand, gravel, and other loose debris.

 Usually occurs with a very flat stream channel with a

heavy load of alluvium and a period of low
discharge.

 Islands may become resistant to erosion if they

 Cont’d
Braided Streams
 Cont’d
 Characteristics of channel patterns
 Rivers as Agents of Degradation
 Rivers are one of the greatest sculpturing agents at
work in humid regions. accounts for 85-90% of total
sediment transport to the ocean basins (glaciers
account for only 7%).
 From the source to mouth of a river three processes
are taking place.

River erosion River transport River deposition

 River Erosion
There are 4 different ways water erodes the
river away
 Attrition is the collision of rock fragments
in the water against one another.
-The rock particles are broken into smaller
pieces and become smoother the longer the
process continues.
 Cont’d
The results of attrition

 See how these rocks are becoming smoother at the

 Cont’d
Abrasion (or Corrasion,) is the grinding of rock
fragments carried by the river against the
bed and banks of the river.
-This action causes the channel to widen and
deepen.
-This grinding is most powerful in flood time
when large fragments of rock are carried
along in the river bed.
 Cont’d
 An additional process is also at work caused by
the force of the water itself known as Hydraulic
action.
 In this rocks are dragged away from the bed
and banks by the force of the running water.
 Corrosion is the process by which river water
reacts chemically with soluble minerals in the
rocks and dissolves them.
 although this is often called solution – confusing
as solution is also a word used in transportation
.
 We often say things like water pipes corrode –
the chemicals in the water seem to eat them
away!
Cont’d
 Factors of river Erosion
Velocity
Stream velocity – the distance water travels in a stream
per unit time.
Velocity is largely controlled by the stream gradient,
channel shape, and channel roughness.
-Expressed in ft./sec.
-The stream reaches its maximum velocity near the
middle of the channel.
 Velocity is the key factor in a stream’s ability to
erode, transport, and deposit
-High velocity – results in erosion and
transportation
-Low velocity – causes sediment deposition
 Cont’d
When the stream goes around a curve, the region of
maximum velocity is displaced by inertia towards the
outside of the curve
 Cont’d
With in a stream channel, three types of flow can be
observed
 Laminar flow -Under very low velocities water flows
through a stream as smooth sheets running parallel to
the bed In this type of flow the direction of water in
the stream is not altered in its direction
 Only the finest particles kind be detached, so laminar
flow is basically non erosive.
 Turbulent flow - under higher flow velocities,
resistance within the flow and that caused by the bed
and sides of the channel (channel topography) cause
the flow to break down into separate currents.
-More erosive than laminar flow and help suspend
material in the stream.
- Is the "normal" type of flow in most streams
 Helical flow - spiral flow in a stream, Caused by
channel shape.
 Cont’d
 Gradient– the downhill slope of the stream bed.
 The difference in elevation between two points
on a stream divided by the distance between
them
 The stream gradient is one of the factors that
controls a stream’s velocity.
 The steeper the slope, the faster the velocity of
flow and the more the energy of the stream will
be to erode materials
 Cont’d
Stream Gradient
 Cont’d
Channel Shape and
Roughness
The shape of the channel also
controls stream velocity.
 In wide, shallow channel water
flow slowly and in narrow channel
it flows rapidly
• The stream in ‘B’ flows slower
than
‘A’ because the wide, shallow channel
in ‘B’ has more surface for the moving
water to drag against – higher friction.
 The roughness of the channel also
controls velocity.
 Roughness creates more friction
and
Roughness of the channel
 Cont’d
Channel shape
 Cont’d
Discharge - is the volume of water that flows
past a given point in a unit of time.
 In streams in humid climates, discharge
increases downstream for two reasons:
1. Water flows out of the ground into the river
through the streambed.
2. Small tributary streams flow into a larger
stream along its length, adding water to the
stream as it travels.
 In an arid climate, a river’s discharge can
decrease in a downstream direction
•as river water evaporates into the air
•and soaks into the dry ground
 River Transport
A river carries or transports eroded materials such
as mud, sand, boulders and dissolved materials on
its journey.
 These materials are known as its load.
Materials or loads transported by the river can be
sub divided in to bed Load, suspended load and
dissolved load
 Bed load: heavy sediment particles that travel on
the streambed. Such materials include sand and
gravel
 These particles may move individually along the
bottom, or they may travel in groups.
 They will deposited when ever the local flow
conditions will not entrain them.
 Suspended load : are fine or light enough to remain
lifted indefinitely above the bottom by the water
 Cont’d
 Dissolved load: soluble products of chemical
weathering process can make up a substantial
dissolved load in a stream.
 Most streams contain numerous ions in solution.
Such as bicarbonate, calcium, potassium, sodium,
chloride, and sulfate.
 Generally, most material is transported in the
suspended load; the least, in bed load
 The load is carried along by four processes.
- traction
- saltation
- suspension
- solution
 Traction is where boulders or stones are rolled or
sliding along the stream bed by the force of the water
Cont’d
 Cont’d
 Saltation :the speed of the water lifts the fragments(
tiny pebbles )of the river bottom, and they bounce
along and leapfrog over each other in a process
called saltation (from a Latin word meaning jump).
-Saltation, therefore is a combination of traction and
suspension.
 Cont’d
Suspension is when very fine particles (suspension)
such as clay, silt and fine sand are carried along in
the river.
-The small particles are held up by the water as they
float because they are very, very small!
 Cont’d
An example of suspension
 Cont’d
Transportation in solution is when dissolved materials
containing minerals like calcium and sodium are
carried in the water and are invisible to the naked eye.
-No picture here because you cannot see them!
 Cont’d
 Time in transport will round transported grains &decrease
size
 River Deposition
A river drops its load when the speed or volume of the
river decreases or competence is reduced.
 Competence - the size of the largest particle that can
be transported by a stream.
 Capacity - the maximum load that a stream could
transport under given conditions; its potential.
-The heavier material is deposited first and the finer
material carried further.
-Rivers reduce their speed when they enter flat land,
enters a lake or the sea or reach an arid area or with
change in gradient or as channel widens or changes
direction.
-The volume can be reduced during a dry season or
when the river passes over more porous landscapes
e.g. sand or limestone.
 Cont’d
 Some of the depositional land forms include levees
,flood plain, delta, alluvial funs , back swamp, point
bars and etc.
-The details of these features will be discussed in the
fallowing section.
-materials deposited by river are known as Alluvium.
-Most alluvium is deposited into quiet water (ocean or
lake).
 River valley development and
associated land forms
Streams develop their valley through the
fallowing ways;
1.Down cutting – the process of deepening a
valley by erosion of the streambed.
 If a stream removes rock from its bed, it can
cut a narrow slot canyon down through the
rock.
 Such canyons are not common because down
cutting is usually is usually accompanied by
mass wasting and sheet erosion of the valley
walls.
 The limit of down cutting is known as base
level; it is a theoretical limit for erosion of the
Cont’d
 Cont’d
2.Lateral erosion: a stream
can de deepening its
channel by cutting while
part of its energy is also
widening the valley by
lateral erosion.
 The erosion of a
stream’s bank and
valley walls as the
stream swings from side
to side across its valley
floor.
 Cont’d
3.Head ward erosion :a stream can also lengthen its
valley by head ward erosion.
 The slow uphill growth of a valley above its

original source through gulling, mass wasting,

and sheet erosion.
 Stream capture (Stream piracy) - an event where a
portion of the flow of one stream is diverted into that
of another by natural processes.
 Cont’d
A. Graded stream
 Has regulated its various stream parameters
(depth, width, slope, velocity, etc.) to obtain the
most efficient conditions for flow and sediment
transport.
 A graded stream is capable of maintaining a
steady-state condition.

Characteristics of a graded stream

 Slope of the longitudinal profile is concave upward,

steeping upstream.
 No falls or basins exist within the channel profile.
 No net erosion or deposition occurs along its
channel.
 The stream is capable of handling all sediment
 Cont’d
B. Non-graded stream
 Energy within the system is not evenly distributed
along the profile; contains falls and basins.
 Falls result in a concentration of energy, which
promotes erosion.
 Basins result in a decrease in energy, which
promotes deposition.
 Young Stage
-Has steep-sided and narrow V-shaped valley created by
vertical erosion
-characterized by waterfalls and rapids.
-Water is often quite clear because the river is not carrying
much load in suspension.
-Velocity is high.
-Down cutting and head ward erosion are the major
processes of river erosion.

and head ward

erosion is dominant
 Cont’d
 Valley profile in the upper course

V shape valley
 Long Profile o f a typical stream

 Is a depiction
of the down
slope gradient of
stream.
 Gorge
 A gorge is a steep, V-shaped valley formed
by the vertical (down ward) erosion of the
land by the river.
 The Indus Gorge in Kashmir is the deepest in
the world (about 5180 m.).
 If the region is arid where there is little
weathering and mass wasting on the valley
sides, the gorge will be impressively deep. If
such a gorge is deep, long and U-shaped, we
call it canyon.
 Cont’d
 In the case of a canyon the valley is
deepened more than they are widened.

 Slot-canyon: Young stream, eroding down and no

mass wasting
 Cont’d
 Water fall : a steep drop in the course of a river.
 It has a high head of water and a characteristic
Plunge pool at the base.
 Waterfalls often form when a band of resistant
rock lies over softer, less resistant rocks.
 Knick point- a sharp irregularity in a stream-
channel profile, commonly caused by abrupt
changes in bedrock resistance and at which
Waterfalls starts.

Plunge pool : also known as a waterfall lake

 Is a pool, lake, or pond that is small in diameter,
but deep.
 Plunge pools can remain after the waterfall has
ceased to exist or the stream has been diverted.
 Cont’d

-Cap Rock - layer of hard resistant rock forming the 'step' over which the
'falls' occur in a waterfall.
 Cont’d
Water fall

Tis Isat” (Blue Nile) Waterfall

 Potholes
 Are depressions that are eroded in to the
land rock of the streambed by abrasive
action of the sediment load.
 When a stream is full, the swirling water can
cause sand and pebbles to scour out
smooth, cylindrical or bowl- shaped
depression in hard rock.
 Tend to form in spots where the rock is a
little weaker than the surrounding rock.
 They may contain certain sand or an
assortment of beautifully rounded pebbles.
 Cont’d
Potholes
 Interlocking Spurs
 spurs are ridges of more resistant rock
around which a river is forced to wind as it
passes downstream in the upper course.

Interlocking spurs form where the river is

forced to swing from side to side around
these
 Cont’d
Interlocking Spurs

River channel
 Maturity stage
 Many tributaries have fed the river upstream.
 The volume of water increases and lateral erosion is
taking place
 River channel has become much wider and deeper
 The surrounding valley has also become wider and
flatter with a more extensive floodplain.
 Meanders
 Bends or loops in the river
 One of the most distinctive features of the river in the
middle course is its increased sinuosity.
 Unlike the relatively straight channel of the upper
course, in the middle course there are many meander
(bends) in the river.
 Cont’d
As water flows into a meander it takes on a
helical or spiral flow that determines where
erosion and deposition is concentrated.
 Centrifugal force draws water toward the
outside bank causing erosion and creates a
bend . Sediment eroded from the outside
bank is deposited on the inside bank
 Slip off Slope - a small beach found on the
inside of a meander bend where deposition
has occurred in the low energy zone.
 River Cliff - a small cliff formed on the
outside of a meander bend due to erosion in
this high-energy zone. when the water in an
ox-bow lake dries
Cont’d
Cont’d
 Neck & Cutoff
 Neck Is the upland between tow consecutive
(opposing) meanders of a stream.
 Cutoff or an Oxbow :occurs when the neck
between river meanders is totally eroded away and
the meanders join to shorten the length of the
channel.
1. A gently meandering river flows through an area
of relatively flat terrain.
2. Water flows at different speeds as it goes around
bends in a meandering river. On the outside banks
of corners, the river water moves the fastest,
causing lateral erosion and undercutting
3. Meanwhile, on the inside banks of corners in the
river, the water flows more slowly, leading to
sediment settling out of the water & building up on
the inside banks.
 Cont’d
4.Gradually, the inside banks are filled in with
accumulated deposits, and the outside bends
extend further and further, forming a wide loop in
the river.
5.The loop continues to bend further and further,
until a thin strip of land called a neck is created at
the beginning and the end of the meander
6. Eventually, the narrow neck is cut through by
either gradual erosion or during a time of
flooding. When this happens, a new straighter
channel is created, diverting the flow of the river
from the loop into the new channel.
7. Deposition finally seals the cut-off from the river
channel, leaving a crescent-shaped land form
known as oxbow lake.
 Meander scar - feature left behind when the water
Oxbow Lakes
 Oxbow Lakes

When the river floods

new course it breaks through the
of the river Meander
thin neckand
meander neck
thebecomes
river takes the
smaller
easier, straight course.
This leaves the
meander loop ‘cut off’
as an oxbow lake. Over
time, the oxbow lake
will become colonised
oxbow lake by vegetation.
 Old Stage
 Final stage of a river is reached when the river is
flowing on more or less flat surface.
 The speed so low that no net erosion occurs any
more.
 Erosion on the slopes is balanced by deposition on
the floodplains.
 Peneplain -a flat and relatively featureless landscape
with minimal relief; considered to be the end product
of the geomorphic cycle. Peneplain means “almost a
plain. The process is known as peneplanation
 From now on the rivers just sweep over the
floodplain and rework the sediment, creating various
floodplain features. Isolated remnants of resistant
bedrock may rise over the Peneplain surface, the so-
called monad nocks or inselbergs.
 Yazoo stream _ a tributary unable to enter the main stream
because of natural levees along the main stream; instead flows
downstream to the back swamp zone and runs parallel to the
 Rejuvenation
 Old or mature stage landforms may be uplifted due to
climate change or tectonic activity
 Entrenched meanders are the result.
 Entrenched meander :a winding, sinuous stream valley
with abrupt sides.
 In a fashion, the landscape reverts to an earlier stage in
its evolution (e.g. from intermediate/mature to the
initial/young stage
Cont’d
 Cont’d
 Because the river is moving on a flat surface, deposits
sediments at the bed often act as barriers to free flow of
water making it to form meanders.
 The meander, in this case, does not, however, occupy
the whole valley bottom as in the case of the middle
course
 Point Bar
 Isa depositional feature of streams.
 Point bars are found in abundance in mature or
meandering streams. Point bars are composed of
sediments that are well stored and typically reflects the
overall capacity of the stream.

 Point bar
deposits on
the inner
meander
bend where
there is low
energy
 Deposition and Erosion of River Bars

Normal Flow

Flood: Increased
discharge and
erosion!

Post-flood; new
bars deposited
 Floodplain
 A relatively flat area that borders a stream, which
is periodically inundated with water during high
flow periods.
 The resulting decrease in velocity causes sediment
carried by the stream, such as gravel, sand, silt,
and clay, to deposit as alluvium on the floodplain.
 Large particles are deposited first, and much of
this material is laid down alongside both banks.
 Bluff : a relatively steep slope at the outer edge of
a floodplain, marking the outer limit of lateral
erosion and undercutting.
 Cont’d
Flood plain

Bluff
 Natural levee
 is a narrow ridge of alluvium deposited at the side of the
channel. During high discharge periods when the stream
floods, coarse sediment settles out near the stream channel
and grades to finer material further away.
 Back swamps
 Located some distance away from the stream
channel on the floodplain.
 When water spills over onto the floodplain, the
heaviest material drops out first and finest material
is carried a greater distance.
 The fine-grained alluvium holds much water and
drains rather slowly creating wetland areas.
 important "sponges" that retain water that might
cause severe flooding downstream.
 Cont’d
Land forms produced by river
 Stream terraces
 Are elevated portions of a floodplain created
when the stream down cuts and creates a new
floodplain at a lower elevation.
 Paired terraces

 Occur at same elevations on opposite valley sides;

produced by intermittent down cutting with
changes in discharge , load or base level.
 Unpaired terraces
 Fragment of former floodplain “accidentally”
preserved (e.g. by a rock buttress) as a
meandering stream slowly degrades it
Stream Terrace
Stream terraces
 Delta
 A landform at the mouth of a river produced.
by the sudden dissipation of stream’s
velocity and the resulting deposition of the
stream’s load.
 Distributaries: branching stream channel that
crosses a delta
 For the formation of a delta the following
necessary conditions should be fulfilled.
-large load,
-low velocity and
-loads must be deposited faster than it
can be removed by the action of tides&
currents
 Cont’d
 The shape of a delta depends on following factors
 the rate of sediment supply,
 wave action and coastal currents reworking the
deposited sediment,
 and the rate at which the alluvial deposits subside.
We have four basic types of delta. These are:
-Arcuate
-Bird foot
- Cuspate
- Estuarine
 1.Arcuate Delta
 Fan or inverted cone-shaped delta .
 Has many active, short distributaries
taking coarse and fine sediment to their
mouths.
 In areas of significant wave activity
sediment will be redistributed laterally
along the delta front to forma smooth
arcuate shoreline with many sand bars,
beach ridges and/or barrier islands.
 Examples :Nile, the Ganges, the Indus, the
Arcuate Delta
 2.Bird’s foot Delta
 Where delta formation is river-dominated and less
subject to tidal or wave action, a delta may take on
a multi-lobed shape which resembles a bird’s foot.
 Tend to have one or a very few major
distributaries near their mouths.
 It consists of very fine martial, called silt. There is
a broad, shallow shelf that deepens abruptly, so the
trend is to grow long and thin like a bird's toe.
 Example;
-Mississippi Delta and
Bird’s foot Delta
 3. Cuspate Delta
 Tooth-shaped delta
 Formed by a river that usually has one
distributaries' emptying into a flat coastline with
wave action hitting it head-on.
 This tends to push the sediment back on both
sides of the mouth, with a "tooth" growing out
onto the shelf.
 Example;
-Tiber River of Italy
-The delta of Niger River
 Cuspate Delta

Tiber River delta of Italy

 4. Estuarine Delta
 Developed when a river that empties into a long,
narrow estuary that eventually becomes filled with
sediment (inside the coastline).
 Examples of this type of delta include ;
-The delta of Seine River of France
-The deltas of the River Vistula (in Poland) and
-The Ob river (USSR)
Estuarine Delta
 Alluvial fans
Are fan-shaped alluvial deposits generally found
when a mountain stream runs on to a flatter surface
at the front of a mountain system.
 Mountain streams carrying a heavy stream load
loses their kinetic energy as they flow out on to the
flat plain depositing alluvium.
 Alluvial fans are quite common in arid regions
where water is lost to evaporation and infiltration
into coarse surface material when the stream exits
the mountain front.
Alluvial fans
 Cont’d
Bajada_ forms when several individual alluvial fans merge
into one broadly sloping surface.

Alluvial Fans - Brooder Peninsula, Baffin Island, Canada.

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