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A cut bank, also known as a river cliff or river-cut cliff, is the outside
A cut bank, also known as a river cliff or river-cut cliff, is the outside bank
A bank is a financial institution that accepts Deposit account, deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital m ...
of a curve (meander
A meander is one of a series of regular sinuous curves in the Channel (geography), channel of a river or other watercourse. It is produced as a watercourse erosion, erodes the sediments of an outer, concave bank (cut bank, cut bank or river cl ...
) in a water channel (stream
A stream is a continuous body of water, body of surface water Current (stream), flowing within the stream bed, bed and bank (geography), banks of a channel (geography), channel. Depending on its location or certain characteristics, a strea ...
), which is continually undergoing erosion
Erosion is the action of surface processes (such as Surface runoff, water flow or wind) that removes soil, Rock (geology), rock, or dissolved material from one location on the Earth's crust#Crust, Earth's crust and then sediment transport, tran ...
.Essentials of Geology, 3rd Ed, Stephen Marshak Cut banks are found in abundance along mature or meandering streams, they are located opposite the '' slip-off slope'' on the inside of the stream meander. They are shaped much like a small cliff
In geography and geology, a cliff or rock face is an area of Rock (geology), rock which has a general angle defined by the vertical, or nearly vertical. Cliffs are formed by the processes of weathering and erosion, with the effect of gravity. ...
, and are formed as the stream collides with the river bank. It is the opposite of a point bar, which is an area of deposition of material eroded upstream in a cut bank.
Typically, cut banks are steep and may be nearly vertical. Often, particularly during periods of high rainfall and higher-than average water levels, trees and poorly placed buildings can fall into the stream due to mass wasting
Mass wasting, also known as mass movement, is a general term for the movement of rock (geology), rock or soil down slopes under the force of gravity. It differs from other processes of erosion in that the debris transported by mass wasting is no ...
events. Given enough time, the combination of erosion along cut banks and deposition along point bars can lead to the formation of an oxbow lake
An oxbow lake is a U-shaped lake or stream pool, pool that forms when a wide meander of a river is meander cutoff, cut off, creating a free-standing body of water. The word "oxbow" can also refer to a U-shaped bend in a river or stream, whether ...
.
Not only are cut banks steep and unstable, they are also the area of a stream where the water is flowing the fastest and often deeper. In geology
Geology (). is a branch of natural science concerned with the Earth and other astronomical objects, the rocks of which they are composed, and the processes by which they change over time. Modern geology significantly overlaps all other Earth ...
, this is known as an area of "high-energy".
See also
* * *References
* Tarbuck, E. J. and F. K. Lutgens. ''Earth'', 7th Edition. Prentice Hall: Upper Saddle River, New Jersey, 2002. pp. 279, 286. {{Authority control Geomorphology Fluvial landforms Limnology