braided stream

American  

noun

1. a stream made up of multiple channels that combine and separate repeatedly as heavy sediment is deposited between them to form shifting islands or bars.

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braided stream Scientific  

/ brā′dĭd /

1. A stream consisting of multiple small, shallow channels that divide and recombine numerous times forming a pattern resembling the strands of a braid. Braided streams form where the sediment load is so heavy that some of the sediments are deposited as shifting islands or bars between the channels.

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Example Sentences

When daylight finally broke Sunday, after two straight days of heavy rain, the road itself looked like a braided stream.

From Seattle Times • Nov. 2, 2021

Today, human evolution looks less like Darwin's tree and more like a muddy, braided stream.

From Salon • Jan. 14, 2020

Berger himself thinks the right metaphor for human evolution, instead of a tree branching from a single root, is a braided stream: a river that divides into channels, only to merge again downstream.

From National Geographic • Sep. 10, 2015

Under what circumstances might a braided stream develop?

From Textbooks • Jan. 1, 2015

On swiftly paced tracks such as June the 15, 1967, their rapid notes become a braided stream of bright sound.

From Time Magazine Archive