Geography Water Cycles and rivers unit

Question 1

What is evaporation?

Answer 1

The transfer from water as a liquid to water as a gas

Question 2

What is transpiration ?

Answer 2

The loss moisture from vegetation

Question 3

What through flow?

Answer 3

The roughly horizontal movement of water through the soil. Water moves back to the river channel, more slowly than via surface runoff but more quickly than groundwater flow.

Question 4

What is condensation?

Answer 4

The transfer of water as a gas (water vapour) to water as a liquid (rain droplets)

Question 5

What is interception?

Answer 5

Precipitation falling onto plants. Some of the precipitation will run off the plants and onto the ground. Some will be stored in the plants.

Question 6

What is groundwater flow?

Answer 6

The movement of water through the rocks above the impermeable layer of bedrock. Water moves back to the river channel.

Question 7

What is surface runoff?

Answer 7

The flow of water across the surface of the ground. It happens when surface is impermeable or the ground is saturated. Water moves back to the river channel rapidly.

Question 8

What is precipitation?

Answer 8

Moisture, e.g. rain or snow, falling from the atmosphere.

Question 9

What is infiltration?

Answer 9

The absorption and downward movement of water into the ground.

Question 10

What happens in the erosion of hydraulic action?

Answer 10

1. The river banks have cracks in it.
2. The flow of the river forces water inside the cracks.
3. Air inside the crack is compressed and it expands.
4. This puts pressure on the bank making cracks widen and making the bank more unstable
5. Parts of the bank break away

Question 11

What happens during attrition?

Answer 11

1. The two rocks smash together with force
2. The rocks break down into smaller, smoother and rounder pieces.

Question 12

What happens in abrasion?

Answer 12

1. Rocks carried by the river are moved towards the river bank and bed.
2. The rocks scrape along the banks and bed eroding them through a sandpaper effect.
3. The rocks also erode and becomes smaller, smoother and rounder.

Question 13

What happens during solution

Answer 13

1. River water is slightly acidic due to absorption of carbon dioxide and humic acid for, vegetation.
2. Carbonate rocks, such as limestone, dissolve.
3. Eventually rocks dissolve completely into the river water.

Question 14

What is a drainage basin?

Answer 14

The area of land around the river that is drained by the river.

Question 15

What is traction?

Answer 15

Rolling Stones along the river bed (this needs the most energy)

Question 16

What is saltation?

Answer 16

Sand-sized particles bounce along the bed in a ‘leap-frog’ movement.

Question 17

What is suspension?

Answer 17

Silt and clay-sized particles are carried within the water flow.

Question 18

What is a watershed?

Answer 18

The border between different river basins.

Question 19

What is confluence?

Answer 19

The point at which two rivers meet.

Question 20

What is deposition?

Answer 20

When a river slows down it ‘drops of’ stones and mud.

Question 21

What is a source?

Answer 21

Where the river starts.

Question 22

What is a mouth?

Answer 22

Where the river meets the sea.

Question 23

What is the upper course like?

Answer 23

Narrow and shallow, v shaped and narrow, steep, slowest, sediment size is biggest and the shape is angular, discharge is lowest.

Question 24

What is the middle course like?

Answer 24

Wider and deeper, open/flat, less steep, medium flow, medium sediment size and sub-angular shape and discharge medium flow.

Question 25

What is the lower course like?

Answer 25

Deepest and widest, flat and wide, flat, fastest, smallest sediment size and rounded shape, discharge is round and flat.

Question 26

What landforms are in the upper course?

Answer 26

Waterfalls and v-shaped valleys.

Question 27

What landforms and in the middle course?

Answer 27

Meanders and oxbows.

Question 28

What landforms are in the lower course?

Answer 28

Flood plain, delta, estuary and river mouth.

Question 29

When do waterfalls occur?

Answer 29

They occur where a band of hard rock overlays a softer rock.

Question 30

Is there erosion?

Answer 30

Yes. Erosion ( mainly hydraulic action and abrasion) wears away the soft rock more quickly than the hard rock.

Question 31

What does the erosion create?

Answer 31

This creates a gorge where water is swilled around, any rocks and debris swept into the plunge pool, deepening it further by abrasion and attrition.

Question 32

What happens over time to the softer rock?

Answer 32

The softer rock is eroded further creating a plunge pool of hard rock which is then unsupported.

Question 33

What happens eventually to the hard rock?

Answer 33

The hard rock collapses creating an overhang, which are steep sided deep river valleys.

Question 34

Does the process of waterfalls repeat.

Answer 34

Yes it repeats continually, with the location of the waterfall moving back upstream.

Question 35

Does a meander flow in a straight line?

Answer 35

No a river rarely flows in a straight line- it will bend around something in its channel. This results in areas of slower and faster water movement.

Question 36

Where does the river flow faster and how?

Answer 36

It flows faster on the outside and erodes the outside bends of the river channel by the processes of hydraulic action and abrasion. This forms a river cliff.

Question 37

Where does the river flow more slowly?

Answer 37

It flows slower on the inside bend of a river and deposits some of its load- this forms a river beach.

Question 38

What forms a meander in the river?

Answer 38

Continuous erosion on the outer bank and deposition on the inner bank. Over time, meanders become larger and more recognisable.

Question 39

What happens at the first stage of making an oxbow lake?

Answer 39

The river starts to erode at the big bends whilst deposition takes place at the corners. This means the river is starting to move as the erosion is making it wider but then deposition is making it smaller in width so at some point 2 rivers will meet.

Question 40

What happens in the 2nd stage of the formation of an oxbow lake?

Answer 40

Erosion occurs here because the neck of the river is slowly eroding causing the rivers to start to meet. This will mean the river can take the shortest course through the neck of the river.

Question 41

What happens in the 3rd stage if the formation of an oxbow lake?

Answer 41

The neck of the meander has now met, leaving a shorter route through the river. It has now left a “u” shape which is called an oxbow lake.

Question 42

What happens in final stage of the formation of an oxbow lake?

Answer 42

Now the river has cut off from the other part making it become an oxbow lake. Eventually the oxbow lake will disappear.

Question 43

What was the environmental effect of the 2022 Pakistan floods?

Answer 43

60% of the country is underwater.

Question 44

What are the economic effects of the Pakistan floods 2022?

Answer 44

£10 billion worth of damage, farmers lost their livestock and grain storage, loss of home long term impact and 60% of the country is underwater.

Question 45

What are the social effects of the Pakistan floods 2022?

Answer 45

The south and the west were baldly flooded, the poor have been the worst effected, loss of homes, 60% of the country is underwater and 33 million people have been effected. Also, people are living in tents on roads, lack of clean water makes people sick and by the end of the flood 1700 people died.

Question 46

What was the aid for the Pakistan floods 2022?

Answer 46

International aid was arriving slowly from Turkey and the Uk, not enough aid arrived early and UN appeal for $160 million from outside Pakistan 1700 people died. Also, reasons for lack of aid reaching people- roads, bridges and rails were destroyed, government set up medical camps to help, 320,000 bridges destroyed and 5000 km of roads destroyed and they were under resourced.