East Fork White River Chute Cutoff with UAS (ESPL), Indiana, 2018

Meandering river sinuosity increases until the channel erodes into itself (neck cutoff) or forms a new channel over the floodplain (chute cutoff) and sinuosity is reduced. Unlike neck cutoff, which can be measured or modeled without considering overbank processes, chute cutoff must be at least partially controlled by channel-forming processes on the floodplain. Even though chute cutoff controls meandering river form, the processes that cause chute cutoff are not well understood. This study analyzes the morphology of two incipient chute cutoffs along the East Fork White River, Indiana, USA, using high temporal and spatial resolution UAS-based lidar and aerial photography. Lidar and aerial imagery obtained between 1998 and 2019 reveals that large scour holes formed in the center of both chutes sometime after chute channel initiation. A larger analysis within the study watershed reveals that scour holes within incipient chutes can be stable or unstable and tend to stabilize when the chute is colonized by native vegetation and forest. When the scour holes form in farmed floodplain, they enlarge rapidly after initial formation and contribute to complete chute cutoff. In addition, this study shows that the formation of scour holes can occur in response to common, relatively low-magnitude floods and that the amount of incipient chute erosion does not depend on peak flood magnitude. The role of scour holes in enlarging of chute channels could be an important mechanism for chute channel evolution in meandering rivers. This study also confirms that understanding the relationships among flow, land cover, and cutoff morphology is substantially improved with on-demand remote sensing techniques like integrated UAS and lidar.

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