How can drainage patterns be changed or altered?

Question

Please explain how.

Answer 1

Erosion or removal of material, blockage from sediments or other objects, and changes in the level of the ground.

An example of an erosional change could be when a stream erodes near it source, eating back further into the highlands until it "captures" a stream from another drainage system. An instance where this appears to have happened is in the Ozarks and allowed speciation with the Missouri Saddled Darter and the Arkansas Saddled Darter.

Blockage would be when something stops the flow of water from its normal route, and rising waters find a new route and cut a new channel to follow even if the blockage is removed. Glaciers caused this to happen with the Milk River and Missouri River in Montana, the Illinois River and Mississippi River in Illinois, and the Ohio River, to name a few.

Ground level change is rarer and usually slower, but earthquakes have caused changes in drainage patterns. A good example is Reelfoot lake in Tennessee, which did not exist before the New Madrid earthquakes.

Changes can be made by humans, usually by digging ditches and creating blockages (dams), but such activities are similar in function to the natural ones. Many artificial canals around the world are examples of this.

Answer 2

Geological drainage patterns depend only on going from high to low (i.e. relative elevations). Elevations are changed by tectonic movement of the earth's crust such as folding, tilting, sinking etc. All three changes can occur when edges of pieces of the crust are moved against or away from each other. Once the actual process of draining begins, the crustal surface begins to be eroded. If the erosion eats through a natural side barrier (such as a ridge line or mountain chain) then suddenly the flow medium can access a new drainage path (or you artifically cut a gap through such a natural barrier.). Such a "natural" event happened at a place called "The Water Gap" at the eastern end of Pennsylvania! The opposite effect would be for some event to slide or fall (or build a dam) into a functioning drainage system and provide sufficient blockage that the flow medium has to find a new exit! Frequently this amounts to finding a place along the confining ridge that is just lightly lower than the place newly blocked! Then-- away it goes into a new drainage system! The general answer is-- by changing the elevation relationships of the components of the present drainage system! Hope this helps!

Answer 3

Fill your toilet with half roll of toilet tissue. Flush twice.
use white chalk to mark boundary. Snake toilet clear,
Flush. Notice the difference?

Answer 4

as in natural landscape in a certain locality, area or country? wind & water erosion