Work and energy
A river's water has energy. Energy is the ability to do work or cause change. Some rivers such as the Merrimack river begin with potential energy due to there position above sea level. Potential energy is energy that is stored and waiting to be used later. Kinetic energy is the energy an object has due to its motion. Gravity can pull water down a slope, the water's potential energy changes to kinetic energy. When energy does work, the energy is transferred from one object to another such as fast moving water wearing away a rock. Along a river moving water can effect how the land around it is. For example: the moving water will wear away the curve of the river widening it out more and the sediment can make oxbow lakes, deltas, etc.
how water erodes
Gravity causes the movement of water across Earths surface. With the help of erosion, the water in rivers picks up and moves sediment. There are also a lot of ways how sediment can enter streams, rivers gullies, etc. Most sediment washes or falls into a river as a result of mass movement and runoff. other sediment erodes from the bottom or sides of the river.
Slopes, river flow, and streambeds
A rivers slope volume of flow and shape of its streambed all affect how fast the river flows and how much sediment it can erode. A fast flowing river carriers more and larger particles of sediment. When the fast moving river slows down it drops the sediment load.If a rivers slope starts to increase the rivers speed will also increase. When a rivers speed increases, the amount of sediment and power to erode increases. A rivers flow is the volume of water that moves past a point on the river. When a river floods its power to erode is way greater than normal. A streambeds shape affects the amount of friction between the water and the streambed. When a river is deeper less water comes into contact with the streambed. In shallower water a lot of the water comes into contact with the streambed. A streambed can have many huge boulders and other obstacles that will help drop of sediment loads. Instead of moving downstream the water moves every direction is called turbulence.