What is a bajada in English?
Definition of bajada 1 Southwest : a steep curved descending road or trail. 2 : a broad alluvial slope extending from the base of a mountain range out into a basin and formed by coalescence of separate alluvial fans.
What is a bajada in geology?
A bajada is the convergence, or blending, of many alluvial fans. Bajadas are common in dry climates, such as the canyons of the American Southwest. Bajadas can be narrow, from the flow of two or three streams of water, or they can be wide, where dozens of alluvial fans converge.
Where are bajadas found?
deserts
Alluvial fans and bajadas are often found in deserts, where flash floods wash alluvium down from nearby hills. They can also be found in wetter climates, where streams are more common. Alluvial fans are even found underwater.
What is pediment and bajada?
The pediment is strictly degradational, the slope cutting across the bedding of older formations, with only a thin veneer of gravelly debris; in contrast, the bajada is a three-dimensional prism, stratified parallel to the slope, and underlain by poorly sorted gravels and detritus, torrent and mudflow deposits, Series …
How is a Bajada formed?
A bajada is often formed by the coalescing of several alluvial fans. Such coalescent fans are often mistaken for erosional landforms known as pediments. The repeated shifting of a debouching stream from one side of a fan to the other spreads the sediment widely and almost uniformly.
Which type of the topography bajada is?
Bajadas are moderately sloping depositional plains located between playa and pediments. They are commonly found in dry climates ( for example the Southwest US) where the flash flood deposits remain over time. Bajada is also commonly found in wetter climates where streams are almost constantly depositing sediments.
What makes a butte?
Buttes are tall, flat-topped, steep-sided towers of rock. Buttes were created through the process of erosion, the gradual wearing away of earth by water, wind, and ice. Buttes were once part of flat, elevated areas of land known as mesas or plateaus. In fact, the only difference between a mesa and a butte is its size.
What is bajada made of?
A bajada is usually composed of gravelly alluvium and may even have large boulders interbedded in it. The slope is usually less than 7°. In humid climates, landforms of this nature are usually referred to as piedmonts.
How is bajada formed?
A bajada consists of a series of coalescing alluvial fans along a mountain front. These fan-shaped deposits form by the deposition of sediment within a stream onto flat land at the base of a mountain.
What is pediments and Pediplains?
Pediments are generally erosional surfaces. A pediment develops when sheets of running water wash over it in intense water. A pediplain is covered by the thinly discontinuous veneer of soil and alluvium derived from the upward areas.
What are Playas in geography?
playa, (Spanish: shore or beach) , also called pan, flat, or dry lake, flat-bottom depression found in interior desert basins and adjacent to coasts within arid and semiarid regions, periodically covered by water that slowly filtrates into the ground water system or evaporates into the atmosphere, causing the …