Accounting /Geography: Rivers Part 1
Geography: Rivers Part 1
This flashcard deck covers key concepts related to river geography, including terms like source, drainage basin, and meander, as well as processes like erosion and transportation.
What is the source of the river?
Where the river begins
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Key Terms
Term
Definition
What is the source of the river?
Where the river begins
What is the drainage basin?
The area from which water drains into a river
What is the water shed?
An imaginary line that separates two drainage basins
What is confluence?
The point where 2 rivers join together
What are tributaries
Smaller rivers which join to the main river
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| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
What is the source of the river? | Where the river begins |
What is the drainage basin? | The area from which water drains into a river |
What is the water shed? | An imaginary line that separates two drainage basins |
What is confluence? | The point where 2 rivers join together |
What are tributaries | Smaller rivers which join to the main river |
How well did you know this? | 1Not at all
3
5Perfectly |
What’s the flood plain? | Land that floods when a river overflows |
What is the mouth of a river? | Where the river flows into the sea or lake |
What’s the river bed? | The bottom of the river channel |
What’s the river banks | The sides of the river channel |
What’s the river long profile? | Shows how a river's gradient changes as it flows from its source to its mouth |
Lost some characteristics of the upper course: | steepest part of the river
small channel but fast flow
high energy levels
river erodes bed
downward erosion
v shaped valleys |
Name some characteristics of the middle course? | slower flow
less steep river banks
more tributaries making river wider
flood plain starts to develop |
Name some characteristics of the lower course: | valley sides are gone
large floodplain
slow movement/flow
deposition is main process |
What is erosion? | The gradual removal of rock from river banks and bed |
What’s corrosion/abrasion? | The bed and banks are worn down by the river's load - rocks hit banks at high velocities to break the banks and bed away |
What’s attrition | The load carried by the river hit each and are broken down into smaller smoother rocks |
What’s solution? | The chemical action of the river water, the acids in the water slowly dissolve the banks and bed of the river |
What’s hydraulic action? | When the force of water is against the bed and banks and eroded it |
Name some ways the rates of erosion can be affected | Discharge, velocity, gradient, rock resistance/type |
What is the bed load? | The material carried by a river as it moves |
What is the transportation process of suspension? | Fine light material carried along the water |
What is the transportation process of solution? | Minerals are dissolved in the water and carried along in water |
What’s the transportation process of traction? | Large boulders and rocks rolled along the river bed |
What’s the transportation process of saltation? | Small pebbles and stones rolled along the river bed |
What's a waterfall? | A geographical formation where flowing water rapidly drops in elevation as it flows over a steep region/cliff |
How do waterfalls occur? | When rivers flow over different types of rock, the soft rock wear away faster than the hard rock. In time a step develops over which the river plunged as a waterfall, water also cuts away rock behind the waterfall, this causes the fells to move back and leave a gorge as it goes. |
What's the water fall cycle | Soft rock worn away -> hard rock undercut -> plunge pool deepens -> hard rock collapses -> waterfall Moves back -> |
What's the thalweg? | The line of fastest flow/velocity |
What is a meander? | A bend in the water course of the river |
The the river cliff in a meander? | Where erosion happens and undercutting occurs On the outer bend |
What's the slip off slope? | Deposition on the inner bend |
Where do meanders occur? | In the middle course - in a wider and deeper channel and an open area with a floodplain |
How does a meander occur? | When there are changing velocities in the middle course and the water flows in a spiral which causes variation in velocity across the channel which creates a thalweg and where there is most an energy in the outer bend erosion processes occur like abrasion and hydraulic action and a river cliff forms however in the inner bend where there is least energy deposition occurs and forms a slip off slope, over time more is eroded and deposited and a meander is formed |
What's an ox bow lake? | A horseshoe area that represents the former course of the river going through a meander |
How does a ox bow lake form? | The thalweg in the outer bend of a meander causes erosion which cause the neck to narrow, then during s flood of when there's a lot of water, it breaks through the neck and so stops going round the meander as water always takes the fastest route, then deposition occurs which blocks the Meander forming an oxbow lake |