Low sinuosity and meandering bedload rivers of the Okavango Fan: channel confinement by vegetated levées without fine sediment

The river systems of the Okavango Fan negate present fluviological perceptions that fluvial geometry is primarily dependent upon the type of sediment load being carried by the river. In northwest Botswana, meandering and low sinuosity rivers, both of which may show anastomosis, are distinctly bedload in character. This is mainly because of a restricted source of clastic sediment, consisting of aeolian sand from the Tertiary to Recent Kalahari Basin. All that seems to be required, therefore, to control low sinuosity and meandering geometries is adequate confinement of channels. In the study examples this is provided by heavily vegetated levées comprising peat, formed from and colonised by a Cyperus papyrus dominated flora: fine sediment plays almost no role in the confinement process. Active and abandoned examples of low sinuosity river channels were studied. An inversion of topography develops in the latter, caused by the low survival probability of metres thick peat levées. Desiccation and burning of peat ultimately form a degraded ash layer only tens of centimetres thick. The channel sand then stands as a ridge rising above the surrounding fan surface. In both examples studied, no crevasse splays occur, but hippopotami trails breach the levées to form minor distributary channels which become filled with sand. The sand ultimately grades backwards to plug the breach. Meander belts are also developed, particularly in the upper fan and entry corridor. Cut banks incise into the sand substrate and scroll bar topographies can be discerned beneath their peat cover. Fine sediment plays no role in the confinement of these channels, which are maintained by peat levées similar to those encountered in the low sinuosity river channels. The recognition of these bedload low sinuosity and meandering river channels now completes the matrix, whereby any geometry of river channel can be developed in bedload, mixed load and suspended load rivers. Important aspects of the modern channels for the study of ancient river systems are (1) the confining effect of peat levées which have low preservation potential geologically, and (2) in helping to explain river systems which show contradictory evidence of semi-arid and more humid climatic conditions. The latter may be explained as perennial rivers entering an otherwise semi-arid climatic regime from a distant source, which provide a shifting "more humid" overprint to the inherent environmental characteristics.