Search: onr:"swepub:oai:DiVA.org:umu-79273" >
Biotic drivers of s...
Abstract
Subject headings
Close
- Traditionally, stream channel planform has been viewed as a function of larger watershed and valley-scale physical variables, including valley slope, the amount of discharge, and sediment size and load. Biotic processes serve a crucial role in transforming channel planform among straight, braided, meandering, and anabranching styles by increasing stream-bank stability and the probability of avulsions, creating stable multithread (anabranching) channels, and affecting sedimentation dynamics. We review the role of riparian vegetation and channel-spanning obstructions-beaver dams and logjams-in altering channel-floodplain dynamics in the southern Rocky Mountains, and we present channel planform scenarios for combinations of vegetation and beaver populations or old-growth forest that control logjam formation. These conceptual models provide understanding of historical planform variability throughout the Holocene and outline the implications for stream restoration or management in broad, low-gradient headwater valleys, which are important for storing sediment, carbon, and nutrients and for supporting a diverse riparian community.
Subject headings
- NATURVETENSKAP -- Geovetenskap och miljövetenskap -- Miljövetenskap (hsv//swe)
- NATURAL SCIENCES -- Earth and Related Environmental Sciences -- Environmental Sciences (hsv//eng)
Keyword
- stream planform
- riparian vegetation
- beaver
- old-growth forest
- restoration
Publication and Content Type
- ref (subject category)
- art (subject category)
Find in a library
-
BioScience
(Search for host publication in LIBRIS)
To the university's database