[mjibson]

The Control of Nature (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Control_of_Nature) is a book that contains this essay and two others (one about Iceland attempting to divert lava flows using pumped ocean water, one about southern CA attempting to build housing in an area dominated by complementary mudslides and firestorms). The whole book is a really great (in John McPhee's unique style) description of what happens when humans attempt to restrict or alter the earth's natural changes.

The above Atchafalaya essay is eye opening about the Mississippi River and how its natural course has swayed back and forth hundreds of miles over the centuries. We have now decided these two rivers should stop moving, but the earth doesn't see it that way. When they hit the gulf, their flow speed lowers, dropping the carried sediment. This causes their mouth to move slightly to an area with less dropped sediment. Humans have built walls attempting to constrain movement, but that may be a long-term losing battle.

Recommended reading, and a nice entry point to McPhee if you haven't read him yet.

[jcranmer]

The Yellow River has had more dramatic movements in recorded history, see this Wikipedia image for how varied its course has been in the past two millennia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_River#/media/File:Yello...

[PhasmaFelis]

What caused the coastline (the dotted blue lines) to change that dramatically over 2500 years?

[acomjean]

The book was a fascinating read. Though sometimes I had to consult a map, it could have used with some visual aids.

Basically that river should take over the bulk of the flow of the Mississippi, but for human intervention, in this case the army Corp of engineers

“ If the Mississippi were allowed to flow freely, the shorter and steeper Atchafalaya would capture the main flow of the Mississippi, permitting the river to bypass its current path through the important ports of Baton Rouge and New Orleans.“

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atchafalaya_River