Varieties of Fluvial Form
edited by
Andrew J. Miller (Univ. of Maryland, Baltimore, Maryland, USA)
Avijit Gupta (University of Leeds, Leeds, UK)
Published by John Wiley & Sons, ISBN: 0-471-97351-3
Hardcover,  Price: US$115.00 est.
Pages: 538
Published February 1999
Copyright: 1998
 
From the Introduction

This collection of papers is based largely on contributions by participants in a series of special sessions at the June 1995 South East Asia Conference of the International Association of Geomorphologists. The concept that draws these papers together is perhaps best explained in the following excerpt from the call for papers that was issued in advance of the conference:

The purpose of this special session is to provide an opportunity for discussion of the diversity of fluvial forms that may arise in "unusual" settings...These may include settings where external forcing factors exert a powerful influence precluding or modifying the type of equilibrium form that is expected to develop under quasi-stable conditions in an alluvial channel: for example, patterns of response to tectonic activity... longitudinal variations in channel and floodplain form associated with spatially varying patterns of bedrock lithology or jointing...arid-region rivers with longitudinal discharge trends that are not monotonically increasing. Also of potential interest are morphological features forming under climatic/hydrologic regimes associated with monsoon, tropical wet, extremely arid or extremely cold environments; or patterns of vegetation distribution that exert a controlling influence on channel form. It is hoped that the papers contributed to this session will encompass a broad range of geographic as well as morphological diversity. In fact the final roster of papers presented here includes examples from Australia; Papua New Guinea; Sri Lanka; India; China; South Africa; Namibia; Antarctica; United States; Mexico; as well as the moon, Mars, and Venus.

The underlying premise was that the world's rivers encompass a wide range of influences and associated fluvial forms, but that the geomorphic literature traditionally has focused most intensively on examples mostly comprised of alluvial rivers from humid temperate, semiarid, or proglacial environments. Although the range of examples covered in the professional literature has certainly broadened over the last couple of decades, the textbooks through which most students are first exposed to geomorphology are focused increasingly on the mechanics of alluvial rivers but for the most part do not treat a spectrum of morphological types that is proportionally representative of the rivers that actually exist on the earth's surface. (The diversity of influences on fluvial form is perhaps better illustrated in some of the texts published by authors from the southern hemisphere; see for example Selby, 1985.) We believe that a presentation that includes some of the outliers on this spectrum may broaden our scientific vocabulary and lead ultimately to improved understanding of fluvial processes and their role in landscape evolution.

Thus the intention of this volume is, first and foremost, to present an international set of case studies with a strong descriptive component, representing the diversity of fluvial forms. Although these examples are by no means unique and they clearly are all governed by the same physical laws, it is also true that virtually everyone who attended the sessions in Singapore had an opportunity to see something that he or she had not seen before. To quote Baker and Komatsu in the opening paper of this volume, ?excitement and pleasure in science derive not so much from achieving the final explanation as from discovering the fascinating range of new phenomena to be explained.? It is our hope that readers of this volume will share some of that excitement and pleasure.

Contents

Foreword
M.Gordon Wolman

Introduction
Andrew J. Miller and Avijit Gupta

Interplanetary Comparisons

Extraterrestrial fluvial forms
V.R. Baker and G. Komatsu

Bedrock and Mixed Bedrock/Alluvial Rivers

Bedrock anastomosing channel systems: morphology and dynamics in the Sabie River, Mpumalanga Province, South Africa
W. van Niekerk, G. L. Heritage, L. J. Broadhurst and B. P. Moon

The geomorphology of the Sabie River, South Africa: an incised bedrock influenced channel
G.L. Heritage, A.W. van Niekerk, and B.P. Moon

Geomorphology of the Green River in the Eastern Uinta Mountains, Dinosaur National Monument, Colorado and Utah
Paul E. Grams and John C. Schmidt

The Narmada River, India through space and time
Avijit Gupta, Vishwas S. Kale, and S.N. Rajaguru

Drainage evolution and morphological development of the late Cenozoic Sundays River, South Africa
Johan Hattingh and Izak C. Rust

Fluvial evolution in areas with volcanic and tectonic activity: the Armería River, Mexico
David Palacios and Armando Chávez

Boulder bedforms in jointed-bedrock channels
Rainer Wende

Arid-region rivers

Floodouts in central Australia
Stephen Tooth

Fluvial form variability in arid central Australia
Mary C. Bourke and Geoff Pickup

The Uniab River fan, an unusual alluvial fan on the hyper-arid Skeleton Coast, Namibia
A.C.T. Scheepers and Izak C. Rust

Downstream adjustments in allochthonous rivers: Western Deccan Trap upland region, India
Leena A. Deodhar and Vishwas S. Kale

Debris flow and sheet flood fans of the northern Prince Charles Mountains, East Antarctica
John A. Webb and Chris. R. Fielding
 
Patterns of alluvial deposition

The Fly River, Papua New Guinea: inferences about river dynamics, floodplain sedimentation and fate of sediment
William E. Dietrich, Geoff Day and Gary Parker

Downstream changes in valley confinement as a control on floodplain morphology, lower Tuross River, New South Wales, Australia - A constructivist approach to floodplain analysis
Rob J. Ferguson & Gary J. Brierley

Flow and sedimentation at tributary river mouths : a comparison with mesotidal estuaries
Barbara A. Kennedy

Geomorphology and coastline change of the lower Yangtze delta plain, China
Zhongyuan Chen

In-channel benches: the role of floods in their formation and destruction on bedrock-confined rivers
Wayne D. Erskine and Elizabeth A. Livingstone

Anabranching rivers: divided efficiency leading to fluvial diversity
Gerald C. Nanson and H. Q. Huang

Review papers

Varieties of fluvial form - the relevance to geologists of an expanded reality
Christopher R. Fielding

Towards an understanding of varieties of fluvial form
Michael J. Kirkby