Rivers are good places to explore the process of flow. Explore the influences and impacts of flowing currents in our ecosystems. Watch how water moves nutrients and shapes riverbeds. See how glaciers, wind and lava flow shapes landscapes. Learn how species have adapted their shapes to live in currents and how plants keep from drifting away.

Exhibit Highlights:

• See how steelhead trout have adapted to life in river currents.
• Aim one of the air blowers at a wall of sequins and create your own river of wind.
• Learn how rivers pick up sediment in one area and deposit it another—like a conveyor belt.
• Find out how rivers are managed through dams and how people are working to share a river among diverse communities.
• Make a river current flow and see why streamlined fish have an easier time swimming upstream.
• On a sand table, create a dam or channel and watch how water carves a landscape.

(*For a description of River Zone plants, see Plants fact sheet.)

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