Take a moment to think about how the Colorado River has evolved through time. Focus on how changing base level and stream incision created landforms, such as incised meanders and rincons, and arrange these events from oldest to youngest.

1) A stream migrates laterally across its floodplain developing meanders. This stream terminates at a lake, which is its base level.

2) A Rincon forms by the cutoff of an incised meander which shortens the river

3) The base level of the stream is lowered by crustal uplift and the river begins to incise downward.

4) Incised meanders form.

1    -       3     -     4    -   2

Explanation:

1  . A stream migrates laterally across its floodplain developing meanders. This stream terminates at a lake, which is its base level.

2. The base level of the stream is lowered by crustal uplift and the river begins to incise downward.

3.Incised meanders form.

4.A rincon forms by the cutoff of an incised meander, which shortens the river.

From its source high in the Rocky Mountains, the Colorado River channels water south nearly 1,500 miles, over falls, through deserts and canyons, to the lush wetlands of a vast delta in Mexico and into the Gulf of California. That is, it did so for six million years.