Water, wind, ice, and waves are the agents of erosion that wear away at the surface of the Earth.

The two main flow factors in sediment transport are the settling rate and the boundary layer shear stress 27.

Sediments carried as solids as the stream flows are called a suspended load. The size of particles that can be carried within a load is determined by the stream’s velocity. Faster streams can carry larger particles. Streams that carry larger particles have greater competence.

Key Concept Rivers and streams are dynamic systems that erode, transport sediment, change course, and flood their banks in natural and recurring patterns. Three types of stream deposits are deltas, alluvial fans, and floodplains.

Both natural and human- caused factors affect the amount of erosion a stream may experience. Natural factors include the gradient (or steepness) of the streambed since that affects the speed of the flow of water. Rainfall and snowmelt affect the amount of water in a stream as well as the speed of the flow.

What factors relate to a stream’s ability to erode material? A stream’s gradient, discharge, and load are the three main factors that control what sediment a stream can carry.

What three factors affect how fast a river flows and how much sediment it can erode? A river’s slope, volume of flow, and the shape of its streambed.

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.

Wind- the least powerful can only move small pieces of rock. It is the slowest agent of erosion.

The most important erosion factors include the climatic, hydrological, topographic, soil, geological and vegetation conditions, as well as the economic and technical and the socioeconomic conditions of the human society.

Major factors that affect the amount of erosion are soil cloddiness, surface roughness, wind speed, soil moisture, field size, and vegetative cover. A discussion of each follows. The cloddiness of a given soil largely indicates whether the wind will erode it.

Aside from desertification, there is no doubt that human activities are a major cause of soil erosion in general. Construction of roads and buildings, logging, mining, and agricultural production have resulted in large amounts of soil erosion in the U.S. and around the world.

The agents of soil erosion are the same as of other types of erosion: water, ice, wind, and gravity. Soil erosion is more likely where the ground has been disturbed by agriculture, grazing animals, logging, mining, construction, and recreational activities.

Soil Erosion: 6 Main Causes of Soil Erosion

• Soil Texture: ADVERTISEMENTS:
• Ground Slope: Steeper slope ground erodes more than the ground having mild slope due to increased speed of run off than infiltration.
• Intensity and amount of rainfall:
• Mismanaged utilization of soil resources:
• Distribution of rainfall and landscape:
• Deforestation:

Following are the important causes of soil erosion:

• Rainfall and Flooding. Higher intensity of rainstorm is the main cause of soil erosion.
• Agriculture. The farming practices are the major cause of soil erosion.
• Grazing.
• Logging and Mining.
• Construction.
• Rivers and Streams.
• Heavy Winds.
• Loss of Arable Land.

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 main on-site impact of soil erosion is the reduction in soil quality which results from the loss of the nutrient-rich upper layers of the soil, and the reduced water-holding capacity of many eroded soils.

Some of the greatest effects of soil erosion include:

1. Loss of Topsoil. Obviously, this is the biggest effect of soil erosion.
2. Soil Compaction.
3. Reduced Organic and Fertile Matter.
4. Poor Drainage.
5. Issues With Plant Reproduction.
6. Soil Acidity Levels.
7. Long Term Erosion.
8. Water Pollution.

Different Soil Erosion Causes

• 1) Sheet erosion by water;
• 2) Wind erosion;
• 3) Rill erosion – happens with heavy rains and usually creates smalls rills over hillsides;
• 4) Gully erosion – when water runoff removes soil along drainage lines.
• 5) Ephemeral erosion that occurs in natural depressions.

Soil erosion is a naturally occurring process that affects all landforms. In agriculture, soil erosion refers to the wearing away of a field’s topsoil by the natural physical forces of water (Figure 1) and wind (Figure 2) or through forces associated with farming activities such as tillage.

wind , water , gravity erosion. There are three main types of soil erosion.

loam

Sand absorbs very little water because its particles are relatively large. The other components of soils such as clay, silt and organic matter are much smaller and absorb much more water. Increasing the amount of sand in the soil reduces the amount of water that can be absorbed and retained.

Sand needed the least amount of water. The soil drained faster because of the large particles that have more space in between.

Sand was the type of soil to drain the fastest. This happens because sand is the type of soil with the largest particles that are loosely spaced, which allows water to move through the soil more freely and drain quickly.