DELTA DEPOSITIONAL SYSTEM

A delta is formed when a river meets a standing water

body, and it dumps the sediment load at the river mouth.
These riverine sediments can then be worked upon by
the hydrodynamic processes of the standing water body.
An essential prerequisite for the formation of a delta and
deltaic deposit is that the river brings appreciable amount
of sediment load and the rate of sediment supply exceeds
the sediment dispersal energy of the standing water body.

The delta deposits are both subaerial and

subaqueous, of river-derived sediment deposited near
the river mouth in a standing water body, and partly
reworked by processes like waves, currents, and tides.
A delta landscape usually shows a wide range of
various coastal and nearshore landforms, as well as
fluvial features.

A delta can be formed in a sea or in a lake or in a pond.

The lake deltas are relatively simple, as there is only a limited
role of lacustrine processes, namely, wave action, longshore
drift to shift the sediments, and the basic structure of the delta
is controlled by the fluvial processes. On the contrary, marine
deltas show high variability in their shape and deposits, as the
sediment brought by the river can be worked upon to varying
degree by the tidal currents and wave action.

The decrease in the flow velocities in the effluent flow by the

process of expanding jet diffusion also causes reduction in the
ability to transport sediment. Sediment is deposited, as the velocities
fall below the competence of the effluent flow. This deposition
creates distributary mouth bar, blocking the flow of river mouth,
which often results in splitting of channels. Beyond the distributary
mouth bar essentially suspended load is deposited in form of
prodelta or delta foresets from the decelerating fully turbulent
effluent. At a greater distance fine-grained horizontal bottomsets are
deposited.