Notes of Ch 7 Landforms and their

Evolution| Class 11th Geography

29 May, 2020

Notes of Ch 7 Landforms and their Evolution| Class

11th Geography
Introduction

• Landform: In simple words, small to medium tracts or parcels of

the earth’s surface are called landforms.

• Each landform has its own physical shape, size, materials and is a
result of the action of certain geomorphic processes and agent

• Several landforms together are called landscape. Each landform

has its own shape, size and materials Geomorphological processes
are slow but significant in long run.

• Every landform has a beginning, they change their shape and

composition in course of time.

• Due to changes in climate and vertical and horizontal movements

landforms change their shape.

• Each landform undergo three stages called youth, mature and old
stages.

• Geomorphology is the science of landforms Various geomorphic

agents bring the changes to the landforms such as running water,
moving ice, wind glaciers, underground water, waves by erosion and
deposition.
• Each geomorphological agent produces its own assemblage of
landforms. Most of the geomorphological processes are
imperceptible. The study of the landforms reveals that the stage
structure and process of land forms. They produce erosional and
depositional features.

Factors influencing erosion

• Rock structures such as fold, fault, joints, fractures, hardness,

softness permeability, and
impermeability.

• Stability of sea level

• Tectonic stability of landmass

• Climate

Running Water

• In humid regions, which receive heavy rainfall running water is

considered the most important of the geomorphic agents in bringing
about the degradation of the land surface.

• There are two components of running water.

→ One is overland flow on general land surface as a sheet.
→ Another is linear flow as streams and rivers in valleys.

• Most of the erosional landforms made by running water are

associated with vigorous and youthful rivers flowing over steep
gradients.
• With time, stream channels over steep gradients turn gentler due
to continued erosion, and as a consequence, lose their velocity,
facilitating active deposition.

• The gentler the river channels in gradient or slope, the greater is

the deposition. When the stream beds turn gentler due to continued
erosion, downward cutting becomes less dominant and lateral
erosion of banks increases and as a consequence the hills and
valleys are reduced to plains.

Overland flow

• It causes sheet erosion.

• Depending upon irregularities of the land surface, the overland

flow may concentrate into narrow to wide paths.

• Because of the sheer friction of the column of flowing water, minor

or major quantities of materials from the surface of the land are
removed in the direction of flow and gradually small and narrow rills
will form.

• These rills will gradually develop into long and wide gullies; the
gullies will further deepen, widen, lengthen and unite to give rise to
a network of valleys.

• The divides between drainage basins are likewise lowered until

they are almost completely flattened leaving finally, a lowland of
faint relief with some low resistant remnants called monadnocks
standing out here and there.

• This type of plain forming as a result of stream erosion is called a

peneplain (an almost plain.)
Youth

• Streams are few during this stage with poor integration and flow
over original slopes showing shallow V-shaped valleys with no
floodplains or with very narrow floodplains along trunk streams.

• Streams divides are broad and flat with marshes, swamp and
lakes.

• Meanders if present develop over these broad upland surfaces.

These meanders may eventually entrench themselves into the
uplands.

• Waterfalls and rapids may exist where local hard rock bodies are
exposed.

Mature

• During this stage streams are plenty with good integration.

• The valleys are still V-shaped but deep; trunk streams are broad
enough to have wider floodplains within which streams may flow in
meanders confined within the valley.

• The flat and broad inter stream areas and swamps and marshes of
youth disappear and the stream divides turn sharp. Waterfalls and
rapids disappear.

Old

• Smaller tributaries during old age are few with gentle gradients.
• Streams meander freely over vast floodplains showing natural
levees, oxbow lakes, etc.

• Divides are broad and flat with lakes, swamps and marshes. Most
of the landscape is at or slightly above sea level.

Erosional Landforms

Valleys

• Valleys start as small and narrow rills; the rills will gradually
develop into long and wide gullies; the gullies will further deepen,
widen and lengthen to give rise to valleys. Depending upon
dimensions and shape, many types of valleys like V-shaped valley,
gorge, canyon, etc. can be recognised.

• A gorge is a deep valley with very steep to straight sides and a

canyon is characterised by steep step-like side slopes and may be
as deep as a gorge. A gorge is almost equal in width at its top as
well as its bottom. In contrast, a canyonis wider at its top than at its
bottom. In fact, a canyon is a variant of gorge.

• Valley types depend upon the type and structure of rocks in which
they form. For example, canyons commonly form in horizontal
bedded sedimentary rocks and gorges form in hard rocks.

Potholes and Plunge Pools

• Over the rocky beds of hill-streams more or less circular

depressions called potholes form because of stream erosion aided
by the abrasion of rock fragments.
• Once a small and shallow depression forms, pebbles and boulders
get collected in those depressions and get rotated by flowing water
and consequently the depressions grow in dimensions.

• A series of such depressions eventually join and the stream valley

gets deepened. At the foot of waterfalls also, large potholes, quite
deep and wide, form because of the sheer impact of water and
rotation of boulders. Such large and deep holes at the base of
waterfalls are called plunge pools.

• These pools also help in the deepening of valleys. Waterfalls are

also transitory like any other landform and will recede gradually and
bring the floor of the valley above waterfalls to the level below.

Incised or Entrenched Meanders

• In streams that flow rapidly over steep gradients, normally erosion

is concentrated on the bottom of the stream channel.

• Also, in the case of steep gradient streams, lateral erosion on the

sides of the valleys is not much when compared to the streams
flowing on low and gentle slopes.

• Because of active lateral erosion, streams flowing over gentle

slopes, develop sinuous or meandering courses.

• It is common to find meandering courses over floodplains and

delta plains where stream gradients are very gentle.
• But very deep and wide meanders can also be found cut in hard
rocks. Such meanders are called incised or entrenched meanders.

• Meander loops develop over original gentle surfaces in the initial

stages of development of streams and the same loops get
entrenched into the rocks normally due to erosion or slow, continued
uplift of the land over which they start.

• They widen and deepen over time and can be found as deep
gorges and canyons in hard rock areas. They give an indication on
the status of original land surfaces over which streams have
developed.

River Terraces

• River terraces are surfaces marking old valley floor or floodplain

levels.

• They may be bedrock surfaces without any alluvial cover or

alluvial terraces consisting of stream deposits.

• River terraces are basically products of erosion as they result due

to vertical erosion by the stream into its own depositional floodplain.

• The river terraces may occur at the same elevation on either side
of the rivers in which case they are called paired terraces.

• When a terrace is present only on one side of the stream and with
none on the other side or one at quite a different elevation on the
other side, the terraces are called unpaired terraces.
• Unpaired terraces are typical in areas of slow uplift of land or
where the water column changes are not uniform along both the
banks.

• The terraces may result due to:

(i) receding water after a peak flow

(ii) change in hydrological regime due to climatic changes

(iii) tectonic uplift of land
(iv) sea level changes in case of rivers closer to the sea.

Depositional Landforms

Alluvial Fans

• Alluvial fans are formed when streams flowing from higher levels
break into foot slope plains of low gradient.

• Normally very coarse load is carried by streams flowing over

mountain slopes. This load becomes too heavy for the streams to be
carried over gentler gradients and gets dumped and spread as a
broad low to high cone shaped deposit called alluvial fan.

• Usually, the streams which flow over fans are not confined to their
original channels for long and shift their position across the fan
forming many channels called distributaries.

• Alluvial fans in humid areas show normally low cones with gentle
slope from head to toe and they appear as high cones with steep
slope in arid and semi-arid climates
Deltas

• Deltas are like alluvial fans but develop at a different location.

• The load carried by the rivers is dumped and spread into the sea.
If this load is not carried away far into the sea or distributed along
the coast, it spreads and accumulates as a low cone.

• Unlike in alluvial fans, the deposits making up deltas are very well
sorted with clear stratification.

• The coarsest materials settle out first and the finer fractions like
silts and clays are carried out into the sea. As the delta grows, the
river distributaries continue to increase in length and delta
continues to build up into the sea.

Floodplains, Natural Levees and Point Bars

• Deposition develops a floodplain just as erosion makes valleys.

• Floodplain is a major landform of river deposition. Large sized

materials are deposited first when stream channel breaks into a
gentle slope. Thus, normally, fine sized materials like sand, silt and
clay are carried by relatively slow moving waters in gentler channels
usually found in the plains and deposited over the bed and when the
waters spill over the banks during flooding above the bed.

• A river bed made of river deposits is the active floodplain. The

floodplain above the bank is inactive floodplain.

• Inactive floodplain above the banks basically contain two types of

deposits — flood deposits and channel deposits.

• The flood deposits of spilled waters carry relatively finer materials

like silt and clay.

• The flood plains in a delta are called delta plains.

• Natural levees are found along the banks of large rivers. They are
low, linear and parallel ridges of coarse deposits along the banks of
rivers, quite often cut into individual mounds.

• During flooding as the water spills over the bank, the velocity of
the water comes down and large sized and high specific gravity
materials get dumped in the immediate vicinity of the bank as
ridges. They are high nearer the banks and slope gently away from
the river.

• The levee deposits are coarser than the deposits spread by flood
waters away from the river. When rivers shift laterally, a series of
natural levees can form.

• Point bars are also known as meander bars.-They are found on the
convex side of meanders of large rivers and are sediments
deposited in a linear fashion by flowing waters along the bank.
almost uniform in profile and in width and contain mixed sizes of
sediments.

• If there more than one ridge, narrow and elongated depressions

are found in between the point bars.
As the rivers build the point bars on the convex side, the bank on
the concave side will erode actively.
Meanders

• In large flood and delta plains, rivers rarely flow in straight

courses. Loop-like channel patterns called meanders develop over
flood and delta plains.

• Meander is not a landform but is only a type of channel pattern.

This is because of propensity of water flowing over very gentle
gradients to work laterally on the banks; unconsolidated nature of
alluvial deposits making up the banks with many irregularities which
can be used by water exerting pressure laterally; coriolis force
acting on the fluid water deflecting it like it deflects the wind.

• When the gradient of the channel becomes extremely low, water

flows leisurely and starts working laterally. Slight irregularities along
the banks slowly get transformed into a small curvature in the
banks; the curvature deepens due to deposition on the inside of the
curve and erosion along the bank on the outside.

• Normally, in meanders of large rivers, there is active deposition

along the convex bank and undercutting along the concave bank.

• The concave bank is known as cut-off bank which shows up as a

steep scarp and the convex bank presents a long, gentle profile and
is known as slip-off bank.

• As meanders grow into deep loops, the same may get cut-off due
to erosion at the inflection points and are left as ox-bow lakes

Braided Channels
• When rivers carry coarse material, there can be selective
deposition of coarser materials causing formation of a central bar
which diverts the flow towards the banks; and this flow increases
lateral erosion on the banks.

• As the valley widens, the water column is reduced and more and
more materials get deposited as islands and lateral bars developing
a number of separate channels of water flow.

• Deposition and lateral erosion of banks are essential for the

formation of braided pattern.

Groundwater

• The surface water percolates well when the rocks are permeable,
thinly bedded and highly jointed and cracked.

• After vertically going down to some depth, the water under the
ground flows horizontally through the bedding planes, joints or
through the materials themselves.

• It is this downward and horizontal movement of water which

causes the rocks to erode.

• Physical or mechanical removal of materials by moving

groundwater is insignificant in developing landforms. That is why,
the results of the work of groundwater cannot be seen in all types of
rocks.
rocks like limestones or dolomites rich in calcium carbonate, the
surface water as well as groundwater through the chemical process
of solution and precipitation deposition develop varieties of
landforms.
• Any limestone or dolomitic region showing typical landforms
produced by the action of groundwater through the processes of
solution and deposition is called Karst topography after the typical
topography developed in limestone rocks of Karst region in the
Balkans adjacent to Adriatic sea.

• The karst topography is also characterised by erosional and

depositional landforms.

Erosional Landforms

• Pools, Sinkholes, Lapies and Limestone Pavements.

• Small to medium sized round to sub-rounded shallow depressions

called swallow holes form on the surface of limestones through
solution.

• Sinkholes are very common in limestone/karst areas. A sinkhole is

an opening more or less circular at the top and funnel-shapped
towards the bottom with sizes varying in area from a few sq. m to a
hectare and with depth from a less than half a metre to thirty
metres or more.

• If the bottom of a sinkhole forms the roof of a void or cave

underground, it might collapse leaving a large hole opening into a
cave or a void below (collapse sinks). The term doline is sometimes
used to refer the collapse sinks.

• When sink holes and dolines join together because of slumping of

materials along their margins or due to roof collapse of caves, long,
narrow to wide trenches called valley sinks or Uvalas form.
Caves

• In areas where there are alternating beds of rocks (shales,

sandstones, quartzites) with limestones or dolomites in between or
in areas where limestones are dense, massive and occurring as thick
beds, cave formation is prominent.

• Water percolates down either through the materials or through

cracks and joints and moves horizontally along bedding planes.

• It is along these bedding planes that the limestone dissolves and

long and narrow to wide gaps called caves result.

• There can be a maze of caves at different elevations depending

upon the limestone beds and intervening rocks.

• Caves normally have an opening through which cave streams are

discharged. Caves having openings at both the ends are called
tunnels.

Depositional Landforms

• Many depositional forms develop within the limestone caves. The

chief chemical in limestone is calcium carbonate which is easily
soluble in carbonated water (carbon dioxide absorbed rainwater).

• This calcium carbonate is deposited when the water carrying it in

solution evaporates or loses its carbon dioxide as it trickles over
rough rock surfaces.
Stalactites, Stalagmites and Pillars

• Stalactites hang as icicles of different diameters. Normally they

are broad at their bases and taper towards the free ends showing up
in a variety of forms.

Stalagmites rise up from the floor of the caves. In fact, stalagmites

form due to dripping water from the surface or through the thin
pipe, of the stalactite, immediately below it

Stalagmites may take the shape of a column, a disc, with either a

smooth, rounded bulging end or a miniature crater like depression.

The stalagmite and stalactites eventually fuse to give rise to

columns and pillars of different diameters.

Glaciers

• Masses of ice moving as sheets over the land (continental glacier

or piedmont glacier if a vast sheet of ice is spread over the plains at
the foot of mountains) or as linear flows down the slopes of
mountains in broad trough-like valleys (mountain and valley
glaciers) are called glaciers.

• The movement of glaciers is slow. Glaciers move basically because

of the force of gravity.

• Erosion by glaciers is tremendous because of friction caused by

sheer weight of the ice.

• The material plucked from the land by glaciers (usually large-sized

angular blocks and fragments) get dragged along the floors or sides
of the valleys and cause great damage through abrasion and
plucking.

• Glaciers can cause significant damage to even un-weathered rocks

and can reduce high mountains into low hills and plains.

Erosional Landforms

Cirque

• Cirques are the most common of landforms in glaciated

mountains. The cirques quite often are found at the heads of glacial
valleys.

• The accumulated ice cuts these cirques while moving down the
mountain tops. They are deep, long and wide troughs or basins with
very steep concave to vertically dropping high walls at its head as
well as sides.

• A lake of water can be seen quite often within the cirques after the
glacier disappears.

• Such lakes are called cirque or tarn lakes. There can be two or
more cirques one leading into another down below in a stepped
sequence.

Horns and Serrated Ridges

• Horns form through head ward erosion of the cirque walls.

• If three or more radiating glaciers cut headward until their cirques

meet, high, sharp pointed and steep sided peaks called horns form.

• The divides between cirque side walls or head walls get narrow
because of progressive erosion and turn into serrated or saw-
toothed ridges sometimes referred to as arêtes with very sharp crest
and a zig-zag outline.

• The highest peak in the Alps, Matterhorn and the highest peak in
the Himalayas, Everest are in fact horns formed through headward
erosion of radiating cirques.

Glacial Valleys/Troughs

• Glaciated valleys are trough-like and U-shaped with broad floors

and relatively smooth, and steep sides.

• The valleys may contain littered debris or debris shaped as

moraines with swampy appearance.

• There can be hanging valleys at an elevation on one or both sides

of the main glacial valley. The faces of divides or spurs of such
hanging valleys opening into main glacial valleys are quite often
truncated to give them an appearance like triangular facets.

• Very deep glacial troughs filled with sea water and making up
shorelines (in high latitudes) are called fjords/fiords.

Depositional Landforms

• The unassorted coarse and fine debris dropped by the melting

glaciers is called glacial till.

• Most of the rock fragments in till are angular to sub- angular in

form. Streams form by melting ice at the bottom, sides or lower
ends of glaciers.
• Some amount of rock debris small enough to be carried by such
melt-water streams is washed down and deposited. Such glacio-
fluvial deposits are called outwash deposits.

• Unlike till deposits, the outwash deposits are roughly stratified and
assorted. The rock fragments in outwash deposits are somewhat
rounded at their edges.

Moraines

• These are are long ridges of deposits of glacial till.

• Terminal moraines are long ridges of debris deposited at the end

(toe) of the glaciers.

• Lateral moraines form along the sides parallel to the glacial

valleys. The lateral moraines may join a terminal moraine forming a
horse-shoe shaped ridge. There can be many lateral moraines on
either side in a glacial valley.

• Many valley glaciers retreating rapidly leave an irregular sheet of

till over their valley floors. Such deposits varying greatly in thickness
and in surface topography are called ground moraines.

• The moraine in the centre of the glacial valley flanked by lateral

moraines is called medial moraine.

Eskers

• When glaciers melt in summer, the water flows on the surface of

the ice or seeps down along the margins or even moves through
holes in the ice.
• These waters accumulate beneath the glacier and flow like
streams in a channel beneath the ice.

• Such streams flow over the ground (not in a valley cut in the
ground) with ice forming its banks.

• Very coarse materials like boulders and blocks along with some
minor fractions of rock debris carried into this stream settle in the
valley of ice beneath the glacier and after the ice melts can be
found as a sinuous ridge called esker.

Outwash Plains

• The plains at the foot of the glacial mountains or beyond the limits
of continental ice sheets are covered with glacio-fluvial deposits in
the form of broad flat alluvial fans which may join to form outwash
plains of gravel, silt, sand and clay.

Drumlins

• Drumlins are smooth oval shaped ridge-like features composed

mainly of glacial till with some masses of gravel and sand.

• The long axes of drumlins are parallel to the direction of ice

movement.

• They may measure up to 1 km in length and 30 m or so in height.

• One end of the drumlins facing the glacier called the stoss end is
blunter and steeper than the other end called tail.

• The drumlins form due to dumping of rock debris beneath heavily

loaded ice through fissures in the glacier. The stoss end gets blunted
due to pushing by moving ice.

• Drumlins give an indication of direction of glacier movement.

Waves and Currents

• When waves break, the water is thrown with great force onto the
shore, and simultaneously, there is a great churning of sediments on
the sea bottom.

• Constant impact of breaking waves drastically affects the coasts.

Storm waves and tsunami waves can cause far-reaching changes in
a short period of time than normal breaking waves. As wave
environment changes, the intensity of the force of breaking waves
changes.

• Other than the action of waves, the coastal landforms depend

upon:
(i) the configuration of land and sea floor;
(ii) whether the coast is advancing (emerging) seaward or retreating
(submerging) landward.

• Assuming sea level to be constant, two types of coasts are

considered to explain the concept of evolution of coastal landforms:
(i) high, rocky coasts (submerged coasts);
(ii) low, smooth and gently sloping sedimentary coasts (emerged
coasts).

High Rocky Coasts

• Along the high rocky coasts, the rivers appear to have been
drowned with highly irregular coastline.
The coastline appears highly indented with extension of water into
the land where glacial valleys (fjords) are present.

• The hill sides drop off sharply into the water. Shores do not show
any depositional landforms initially.

• Erosion features dominate along high rocky coasts, waves break

with great force against the land shaping the hill sides into cliffs.

• With constant pounding by waves, the cliffs recede leaving a

wave-cut platform in front of the sea cliff. Waves gradually minimise
the irregularities along the shore.

• Bars are submerged features and when bars show up above water,
they are called barrier bars.
Barrier bar which get keyed up to the headland of a bay is called a
spit.

• When barrier bars and spits form at the mouth of a bay and block
it, a lagoon forms. The lagoons would gradually get filled up by
sediments from the land giving rise to a coastal plain.

Low Sedimentary Coasts

• Along low sedimentary coasts the rivers appear to extend their

length by building coastal plains and deltas. The coastline appears
smooth with occasional incursions of water in the form of lagoons
and tidal creeks.

• The land slopes gently into the water. Marshes and swamps may
abound along the coasts.
• When waves break over a gently slopingsedimentary coast, the
bottom sediments get churned and move readily building bars,
barrier bars, spits and lagoons.

• Lagoons would eventually turn into a swamp which would

subsequently turn into a coastal plain.

• The west coast of our country is a high rocky retreating coast.

Erosional forms dominate in the west coast.

• The east coast of India is a low sedimentary coast. Depositional

forms dominate in the east coast.

Eroisonal Landforms

Cliffs, Terraces, Caves and Stacks

• Wave-cut cliffs and terraces are two forms usually found where
erosion is the dominant shore process.

• Almost all sea cliffs are steep and may range from a few metre to
30 metre or even more. At the foot of such cliffs there may be a flat
or gently sloping platform covered by rock debris derived from the
sea cliff behind.

• Such platforms occurring at elevations above the average height

of waves is called a wave-cut terrace.

• The lashing of waves against the base of the cliff and the rock
debris that gets smashed against the cliff along with lashing waves
create hollows and these hollows get widened and deepened to form
sea caves.
• The roofs of caves collapse and the sea cliffs recede further inland.
Retreat of the cliff may leave some remnants of rock standing
isolated as small islands just off the shore. Such resistant masses of
rock, originally parts of a cliff or hill are called sea stacks.

Depositional Landforms

Beaches and Dunes

• Beaches are characteristic of shorelines that are dominated by

deposition, but may occur as patches along even the rugged shores.

• Most of the sediment making up the beaches comes from land

carried by the streams and rivers or from wave erosion. Beaches are
temporary features.

• Most of the beaches are made up of sand sized materials. Beaches

called shingle beaches contain excessively small pebbles and even
cobbles.

• Just behind the beach, the sands lifted and winnowed from over
the beach surfaces will be deposited as sand dunes. Sand dunes
forming long ridges parallel to the coastline are very common along
low sedimentary coasts.

Bars, Barriers and Spits

• A ridge of sand and shingle formed in the sea in the off-shore zone
(from the position of low tide waterline to seaward) lying
approximately parallel to the coast is called an off-shore bar.

• An off-shore bar which is exposed due to further addition of sand is

termed a barrier bar.

• The off-shore bars and barriers commonly form across the mouth
of a river or at the entrance of a bay. Sometimes such barrier bars
get keyed up to one end of the bay when they are called spits. Spits
may also develop attached to headlands/hills. The barriers, bars and
spits at the mouth of the bay gradually extend leaving only a small
opening of the bay into the sea and the bay will eventually develop
into a lagoon.

• The lagoons get filled up gradually by sediment coming from the

land or from the beach itself (aided by wind) and a broad and wide
coastal plain may develop replacing a lagoon.

• The coastal off-shore bars offer the first buffer or defence against
storm or tsunami by absorbing most of their destructive force. Then
come the barriers, beaches, beach dunes and mangroves, if any, to
absorb the destructive force of storm and tsunami waves. So, if we
do anything which disturbs the ‘sediment budget’ and the
mangroves along the coast, these coastal forms will get eroded
away leaving human habitations to bear first strike of storm and
tsunami waves.

Winds

• Wind is one of the two dominant agents in hot deserts. The desert
floors get heated up too much and too quickly because of being dry
and barren.

• The heated floors heat up the air directly above them and result in
upward movements in the hot lighter air with turbulence, and any
obstructions in its path sets up eddies, whirlwinds, updrafts and
downdrafts.
• Winds also move along the desert floors with great speed and the
obstructions in their path create turbulence. Of course, there are
storm winds which are very destructive.

• Winds cause deflation, abrasion and impact.

• Deflation includes lifting and removal of dust and smaller particles

from the surface of rocks. In the transportation process sand and silt
act as effective tools to abrade the land surface.

• The impact is simply sheer force of momentum which occurs when

sand is blown into or against a rock surface. It is similar to sand-
blasting operation.

• The desert rocks devoid of vegetation, exposed to mechanical and

chemical weathering processes due to drastic diurnal temperature
changes, decay faster and the torrential rains help in removing the
weathered materials easily.

• That means, the weathered debris in deserts is moved by not only

wind but also by rain/sheet wash.
The wind moves fine materials and general mass erosion is
accomplished mainly through sheet floods or sheet wash. Stream
channels in desert areas are broad, smooth and indefinite and flow
for a brief time after rains.

Erosional Landforms

Pediments and Pediplains

• Gently inclined rocky floors close to the mountains at their foot

with or without a thin cover of debris, are called pediments.
• Such rocky floors form through the erosion of mountain front
through a combination of lateral erosion by streams and sheet
flooding.

• Once, pediments are formed with a steep wash slope followed by

cliff or free face above it, thesteep wash slope and free face retreat
backwards.

• This method of erosion is termed as parallel retreat of slopes

through back wasting. So,
through parallel retreat of slopes, the pediments extend backwards
at the expense of mountain front, and gradually, the mountain gets
reduced leaving an inselberg which is a remnant of the mountain.

• That’s how the high relief in desert areas is reduced to low

featureless plains called pediplains.

Playas

• Plains are by far the most prominent landforms in the deserts. In

basins with mountains and hills around and along, the drainage is
towards the centre of the basin and due to gradual deposition of
sediment from basin margins, a nearly level plain forms at the
centre of the basin.

• In times of sufficient water, this plain is covered up by a shallow

water body. Such types of shallow lakes are called as playas where
water is retained only for short duration due to evaporation and
quite often the playas contain good deposition of salts. The playa
plain covered up by salts is called alkali flats.

Deflation Hollows and Caves

• Weathered mantle from over the rocks or bare soil, gets blown out
by persistent movement of wind currents in one direction. This
process may create shallow depressions called deflation hollows.

• Deflation also creates numerous small pits or cavities over rock

surfaces. The rock faces suffer impact and abrasion of wind-borne
sand and first shallow depressions called blow outs are created, and
some of the blow outs become deeper and wider fit to be called
caves.

Mushroom, Table and Pedestal Rocks

• Many rock-outcrops in the deserts easily susceptible to wind

deflation and abrasion are worn out quickly leaving some remnants
of resistant rocks polished beautifully in the shape of mushroom with
a slender stalk and a broad and rounded pear shaped cap above.

• Sometimes, the top surface is broad like a table top and quite
often, the remnants stand out like pedestals.

Depositional Landforms

• Wind is a good sorting agent. Depending upon the velocity of

wind, different sizes of grains are moved along the floors by rolling
or saltation and carried in suspension and in this process of
transportation itself, the materials get sorted.

• When the wind slows or begins to die down, depending upon sizes
of grains and their critical velocities, the grains will begin to settle.
So, in depositional landforms made by wind, good sorting of grains
can be found.
• Wind is there everywhere and wherever there is good source of
sand and with constant wind directions, depositional features in arid
regions can develop anywhere.

Sand Dunes

• Dry hot deserts are good places for sand dune formation.
Obstacles to initiate dune formation are equally important. There
can be a great variety of dune forms.

• Crescent shaped dunes called barchans with the points or wings

directed away from wind direction i.e., downwind, form where the
wind direction is constant and moderate and where the original
surface over which sand is moving is almost uniform.

• Parabolic dunes form when sandy surfaces are partially covered

with vegetation. That means parabolic dunes are reversed barchans
with wind direction being the same.

• Seif is similar to barchan with a small difference. Seif has only one
wing or point. This happens when there is shift in wind conditions.
The lone wings of seifs can grow very long and high.

• Longitudinal dunes form when supply of sand is poor and wind

direction is constant. They appear as long ridges of considerable
length but low in height.

• Transverse dunes are aligned perpendicular to wind direction.

These dunes form when the wind direction is constant and the
source of sand is an elongated feature at right angles to the wind
direction. They may be very long and low in height.
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