Jump to content

Plunge basin

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Mansell (talk | contribs) at 08:07, 27 November 2009. The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

A plunge basin, in hydrology, is a stretch of a river or creek in which the water depth is above average and the stream velocity is quite low. Such pools can be important for juvenile fish habitat, especially where many stream reaches attain high summer temperatures and very low flow dry season characteristics. A stream pool may be bedded in sediment or armoured with gravels; in some cases the pool formations may have been formed as basins in bedrock materials. This portion of a stream often provides specialized aquatic habitat for organisms that have difficulty feeding or navigating in swifter reaches of the stream.

See also