Definition of different Water Bodies - Netsol Water Solutions

HUMANKIND has built civilizations around water. From the very beginning, we have subsisted on and resided near water. Let us explore the definition of the various forms of aquatic geology. The precise definitions could be very blurry and confusing, however. What exactly is a sound, a site, and a ghyll? What’s the difference between a bight and a bay? What are the different words for a small stream? Living on the American seacoast can make you familiar with shoals and inlets. Living in Norway or Scotland can make you familiar with the definition of the fjords or lochs respectively. 

Let us explore many different types of bodies of water that define the wetter parts of the world. To understand the distinction between the most common terms for flowing water (anything with a natural current moving from high to low), it is roughly defined by size. There is an old saying which goes as, “one can step over a brook, one can jump over a creek, one can wade across a stream and one can swim across a river.” A stream is a generic term for flowing water. A river is the largest form of a stream A creek is a small stream A brook is an even smaller stream (used in Old English) A rivulet is a very small stream or baby stream A rill is a very small brook or rivulet A beck is another name for small stream A kill is an old Dutch term in colonial New York for creek or stream A streamlet is a small stream A runnel, also called runlet, run, rundle or rindle is a small stream or brook or rivulet A brooklet is a small brook a bourn is a small stream, particularly one that flows intermittently or seasonally A beck is a small river or synonym for stream or brook A crick is a variation in the pronunciation of creek in parts of the U.S. A ghyll is a narrow stream or rivulet, or a ravine through which through small stream flows A syke or sike is another Old English term for a small stream, especially one that is dry in summer A burn is a large stream in Scotland and England Spring is when water flows up from under the ground to the surface. A bayou is a very slow-moving water, referring to a tributary of a lake or river that is sluggish, marshy as well as filled with vegetation. A tributary is a stream that flows into a larger mainstream or river, A distributary is a stream that branches off from the main river and flows away from it. A meander is a turn or bend in a winding river. A freshet is a sudden flow of freshwater from rapid heavy rain or melting snow after a spring thaw. (It can also refer to the place where a river or stream empties into the ocean, merging freshwater with saltwater.) An estuary is where a river empties into the sea—the place where the mouth of the river meets out the ocean tide. The headwaters is the source, the very beginning of a river, or stream. A gulf is the largest of these broad inlets and tends to have a narrow mouth opening to the sea. A bay is smaller than gulf and also largely landlocked but with a wider mouth. A cove is a small recess or indent in the shoreline that forms a sheltered nook with a narrow entrance to the sea. A bight is a wide indent of the shore, like a bay but smaller and broader—these bights were historically a perfect safe harbor for pirates. The ports are defined as any geographical area where ships are loaded and unloaded. A roadstead (or “roads”) is a sheltered body of water near the shore but slightly outside the enclosed harbor (the place where ships anchor while they wait to enter the port). A lake is a term for a large body of water surrounded by land on all sides. A pond is just a smaller version and often formed artificially. A mere is a shallow but broadsheet of standing water, particularly in Old English dialects or literature. A puddle is even smaller and shallower, typically consisting of dirty rainwater. A pool is a deep body of still freshwater. A tarn is a small pool or lake found in the mountains, sometimes with steep banks formed by a glacier. An oxbow lake (named for its characteristic U-shaped curve) is formed when a wide bend in a river is eventually cut off from the mainstream entirely by erosion and becomes a free-standing pool of water. A loch is a lake or inlet of the sea that is nearly landlocked primarily in Scotland. An inlet is a place where the sea projects inland as an indent in the shoreline like a bay or gulf. An arm of the sea or sea arm is a place where the sea projects inland like a more narrow water passage opening from the coastline. Firth is a regional word used in Scotland, is similar in that it’s a narrow inlet of the sea, or a large sea bay, or the long arm of the sea. A fjord is a long, narrow inlet flanked by steep cliffs on three sides and is connected to the sea. It’s formed when a glacier (common along the Norwegian coast) cuts a U-shaped valley below sea level that fills with the sea when the glacier retreats. A sound is an ocean inlet quite larger than a bay and wider than a fjord. It is specifically a part of the ocean between two bodies of land, like a wide inlet that is parallel to the coastline flanked by a nearby island. A channel is also constrained on two sides by banks but is specifically a bed of water that joins two larger bodies of water. A strait is similar to a channel only narrower. A lagoon is a shallow elongated body of water separated from a larger body of water by a sandbank, coral reef or other barriers, A Barachois is a coastal lagoon separation by the ocean by a sandbar that may periodically get filled with salt water when the tide is high. A billabong defines where a river changes course and creates an isolated stagnant pool of backwater behind where the former branch dead ends. A narrows is a narrow water passage where a strait or river passes through a vertical bed of hard rock. Alee is a natural body of running water flowing under the earth Read More Topics:  

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