Rivers And Streams

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Rivers and streams are very important to the ecosystem and provide homes to many animals and plants. Rivers and streams can be found throughout the world and are essential to the way many mammals live their lives. According to Marrian-Webster, a river is a larger body of water that flows into another body of water (1). Streams are another type of water that flows but are smaller than a river (2).
Rivers and Streams can have several different sources of where their water comes originates but just like everything that water was once precipitation. When a form of precipitation falls to the earth’s surface, there are several things that can occur to that water molecule. The first situation is that the molecule evaporates back up into the earth’s atmosphere where it rejoins the water cycle. The other two situations that can occur are what trigger the formation of rivers and streams. Water can be absorbed into the ground and merges with the groundwater or run off the land surface into a river or stream. There are three different types of streams that funnel water to rivers ephemeral, intermittent, and perennial ( ). Ephemeral are streams that carry water only after a precipitation event; intermittent streams are downstream from ephemeral and are streams that transport water during wet seasons ( ). Ephemeral and intermittent do not consist of just runoff water from the surrounding areas but are also supplied with groundwater ( ). The last type of stream is called a perennial. Perennial streams are downstream from both the ephemeral and intermittent and consist of a stream that transports water year round ( ). The water that forms a river most likely started off as some type of precipitation that landed on the area that surrounds the...

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...d be affected by floodplains. The study of peak discharge of a given area can help humans better predict the chance of a flood. These predictions will help people determine how to protect communities from future floods and also decide whether or not an area is a safe place to develop new communities. However, sediments are deposited by the river during floods. Flooding gives a rich supply of sediment-born nutrients to the soil, so areas around rivers with wide floodplains are usually used for farming.
Rivers and streams are essential to all forms of life as they are part of the ginormous cycle of life. If one little river or stream disappears, everything is going feel the impact. Humans need to start protecting the natural resources that are out there. As more and more water melts from glaciers, rivers and streams will continue to see more and more water in them.

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