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Anastomosing Pattern

Encyclopedia of Planetary Landforms

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Definition

The planform of splitting and rejoining channels that enclose variously shaped and sized islands of remnant floodplain or non-alluvial landforms.

Category

A type of channel pattern

Description

On Earth, the term anastomosing is commonly applied to alluvial rivers that are composed of two or more interconnected channels that enclose flood basins (Makaske 2001; Figs. 1 and 2). Nevertheless, the term has also been applied to rivers that split and rejoin around bedrock islands that, obviously, lack flood basin morphology (Baker 2009). Alluvial rivers with a braided pattern roughly show a comparable planform of splitting and rejoining channels, but a fundamental difference is the cross-sectional morphology of the islands, which is bar-like and convex-up in braided rivers and typically saucer-shaped and concave-up in anastomosing rivers. These morphological differences reflect different modes of formation, i.e., in-channel bar accretion in braided rivers and channel avulsion (see a...

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Soil Geography and Landscape group, Wageningen University, Wageningen, The Netherlands

    Bart Makaske

  2. Alterra, Wageningen University and Research centre, Wageningen, The Netherlands

    Bart Makaske

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  1. Bart Makaske
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Correspondence to Bart Makaske .

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Makaske, B. (2014). Anastomosing Pattern. In: Encyclopedia of Planetary Landforms. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-9213-9_463-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-9213-9_463-1

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  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4614-9213-9

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Chapter history

  1. Latest

    Anastomosing Pattern
    Published:
    02 August 2022

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-9213-9_463-2

  2. Original

    Anastomosing Pattern
    Published:
    12 August 2014

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-9213-9_463-1

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