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In geology, river capture is an event in which one river or stream captures or intercepts part of another. River captures are natural rather than man-made events. A variety of mechanisms can cause river capture, but the two most common causes are catastrophic geological events (earthquakes or earth tremors and consequent large scale crustal deformations; land slips) and erosion, where the course of one river moves laterally and eventually cuts into the course of another.
River capture is a shaping force in the biogeography or distribution of many freshwater fish species.
Example: Australian freshwater fish
Australia provides a particularly fascinating series of examples of freshwater fish species and distributions resulting from river capture events. The formerly massive Great Dividing Range runs the length of the eastern coastline of Australia and has isolated native freshwater fish populations east and west of the range for millions of years. In the last couple of million years erosion has reduced the Great Dividing Range to a critical point where west-to-east river capture events have been possible. A number of native fish species that originated in the Murray-Darling river sytem to the west are (or were) found naturally occurring in a number of coastal systems spanning almost the entire length of the range.
None of the river capture events that allowed native fish of the Murray-Darling system to cross into and colonise these East Coast river systems seem to have formed permanent linkages. The colonising Murray-Darling fish in these East Coast river systems have therefore become isolated from their parent species, and due to isolation, the founder effect, genetic drift and natural selection, have become separate species (see allopatric speciation).
Examples include:
- Golden perch (Dawson-Fitzroy river system, central Queensland).
- Eel-tailed Catfish (several rivers, northern New South Wales)
- Macquarie perch (Hawkesbury-Nepean rivers, Shoalhaven River, southern New South Wales).
- River Blackfish (multiple rivers, Victoria).
- Murray Cod, whose eastern species/subspecies are:
- Eastern Freshwater Cod (Clarence River system, northern New South Wales. It was also found in the Richmond River system in New South Wales but that population is now extinct.)
- Brisbane River Cod (Brisbane River system, southern Queensland. That population is now extinct, and its exact taxonomic status is not known.)
- The Mary River Cod (Mary River, southern/central Queensland.)
- The Mountain Galaxias species complex (multiple rivers, southern Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria).
Olive Perchlet (Ambassis agassizii), Western Carp Gudgeon (Hypseleotris klungzingeri), Pygmy Perch (Nannoperca australis) and Australian Smelt (Retropinna semoni) also appear to have made crossings into coastal systems, the last two species seemingly many times as they are found in most or all coastal streams in south eastern Australia as well as the Murray-Darling system!
Unfortunately, with the exception of Eastern Freshwater Cod and Mary River Cod, it has not been widely recognised that these coastal populations of Murray-Darling native fish are separate species and their classifications have not been updated to reflect this. Many are threatened and two, the Richmond River Cod and the Brisbane River Cod, have become extinct.
Barmah Choke
About 25,000 years BP, an up lift of the plains near Moama first dammed the Murray River and then forced it to take a new course. The new course dig its way through the socalled Bermah Choke and the captured the lower course of the Goulburn River for 500km.
Barrier Range
The original course of the Murray River was to a mouth near Port Pirie where a large delta is still visible protruding into the calm waters of Spencer Gulf. An uplift of the land blocked the river near the southern end of the Flinders Ranges, and the river eventually found its way to a new mouth near Lake Alexandrina.
"River capture"