Water moving across the earth in streams and rivers pushes along soil and breaks down pieces of rock in a process called erosion. The moving water carries away rock and soil from some areas and deposits them in other areas, creating new landforms or changing the course of a stream or river.

The effects of soil erosion go beyond the loss of fertile land. It has led to increased pollution and sedimentation in streams and rivers, clogging these waterways and causing declines in fish and other species. And degraded lands are also often less able to hold onto water, which can worsen flooding.

The three main forces that cause erosion are water, wind, and ice. Water is the main cause of erosion on Earth. Although water may not seem powerful at first, it is one of the most powerful forces on the planet. Rivers – Rivers can create a significant amount of erosion over time.

Rainfall and surface runoff Splash erosion is generally seen as the first and least severe stage in the soil erosion process, which is followed by sheet erosion, then rill erosion and finally gully erosion (the most severe of the four).

The four main types of river erosion are abrasion, attrition, hydraulic action and solution. Abrasion is the process of sediments wearing down the bedrock and the banks.

Liquid water is the major agent of erosion on Earth. Rain, rivers, floods, lakes, and the ocean carry away bits of soil and sand and slowly wash away the sediment. Rainfall produces four types of soil erosion: splash erosion, sheet erosion, rill erosion, and gully erosion.

Abrasion is a process of erosion which occurs when material being transported wears away at a surface over time. It is the process of friction caused by scuffing, scratching, wearing down, marring, and rubbing away of materials. Objects transported in waves breaking on coastlines cause abrasion.

Abrasive wear is the loss of material by the passage of hard particles over a surface. Erosive wear is caused by the impact of particles against a solid surface.

Erosion involved three processes: detachment (from the ground), transportation (via water or wind), and deposition. The deposition is often in places we don’t want the soil such as streams, lakes, reservoirs, or deltas.

Erosion is the process by which the surface of the Earth gets worn down. Erosion can be caused by natural elements such as wind and glacial ice. The key to erosion is something called “fluid flow.” Water, air, and even ice are fluids because they tend to flow from one place to another due to the force of gravity.

Other effects of erosion include increased flooding, increased sedimentation in rivers and streams, loss of soil nutrients’ and soil degradation, and, in extreme cases, desertification. It becomes harder to grow crops on eroded soils and local flora and fauna typically suffer.

Erosion by Glaciers Like flowing water, flowing ice erodes the land. It also can deposit the material elsewhere. Glaciers cause erosion in two main ways: plucking and abrasion. They freeze to the bottom of the glacier and are carried away by the flowing ice.

Barriers of sand and rock positioned at the base of glaciers would stop ice sheets sliding and collapsing, and prevent warm water from eroding the ice from beneath, according to research published this week in the Cryosphere journal, from the European Geosciences Union.

Erosion occurs at the Earth’s surface, and has no effect on the Earth’s mantle and core. Most of the energy that makes erosion happen is provided by the Sun. The Sun’s energy causes the movement of water and ice in the water cycle and the movement of air to create wind. Erosion can cause problems that affect humans.

A glacier’s weight, combined with its gradual movement, can drastically reshape the landscape over hundreds or even thousands of years. The ice erodes the land surface and carries the broken rocks and soil debris far from their original places, resulting in some interesting glacial landforms.

Glacial lakes are examples of ice erosion. They occur when a glacier carves its way into a place and then melts over time, filling up the space that it carved out with water. One such glacial lake is called Lake Louise and is located in Alberta, Canada.

The potential for severe soil erosion is a consequence of wildfire because as a fire burns it destroys plant material and the litter layer. Shrubs, forbs, grasses, trees, and the litter layer break up the intensity of severe rainstorms. Fire can destroy this soil protection.

Fire removes low-growing underbrush, cleans the forest floor of debris, opens it up to sunlight, and nourishes the soil. Reducing this competition for nutrients allows established trees to grow stronger and healthier.

Intense burns may have detrimental effects on soil physical properties by consuming soil organic matter. Intense fires (> 400 C) may also permanently alter soil texture by aggregating clay particles into stable sand-sized particles, making the soil texture more coarse and erodible.

Fire typically results in the reduction of fuel and soil organic nutrient pools by oxidation, volatilisation, convection, leaching, and erosion of nutrients from a site.

Dirt is mostly fine granulated rock with some organic debris, or decomposition remains of organic material blended in. Some of the organic material may combust but the entire process is sure to be endothermic. Dirt is an extremely effective fire stop. If you put your hand above a burning match, your hand feels hot.

The impact of fires on vegetation and wildlife is obvious. Nutrient levels and soil organic matter both increase after fire. Spanish research showed a significant increase in soil pH, carbon and nutrients immediately after a prescribed grass fire.

In general, fires reduce the pool of nutrients stored in organic matter, release a flush of plant available nutrients in the short term, and redistribute nutrients through the soil profile.

Farmers burn their fields to remove plants that are already growing and to help the plants that are about to come up. These burns are often called “prescribed burns” because they are used to improve the health of the field.

Flame weeding entails passing a flame over a weed briefly to heat the plant tissues just enough to kill them. The goal is not to burn up the weed, but to destroy plant tissue so that the weed dies. Flame weeding kills the above ground portion of the weed, but it doesn’t kill the roots.

Each spring farmers and other land managers use controlled burns (also called prescribed burns) to put nutrients back into the soil and revitalize the land. These prescribed burns are often applied to road side ditches where dead plant matter can build up quickly. Fires can also help seed new plants.