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Watershed delineation is the process of identifying the boundary of a watershed, also referred to as a catchment, drainage basin, or river basin.It is an important step in many areas of environmental science, engineering, and management, for example to study flooding, aquatic habitat, or water pollution.
As of 2010 there are six levels in the hierarchy, represented by hydrologic unit codes from 2 to 12 digits long, called regions, subregions, basins, subbasins, watersheds, and subwatersheds. The table below describes the system's hydrologic unit levels and their characteristics, along with example names and codes.
Another example is the system of assigning IDs to watersheds devised by Otto Pfafstetter , known as the Pfafstetter Coding System or the Pfafstetter System. Drainage areas are delineated in a hierarchical fashion, with "level 1" watersheds at continental scales, subdivided into smaller level 2 watersheds, which are divided into level 3 ...
The list of drainage basins by area identifies basins (also known as "catchments" or, in North American usage, "watersheds"), sorted by area, which drain to oceans, mediterranean seas, rivers, lakes and other water bodies.
The process of finding a drainage boundary is referred to as watershed delineation. Finding the area and extent of a drainage basin is an important step in many areas of science and engineering. Most of the water that discharges from the basin outlet originated as precipitation falling on the basin. [11]
In North America, "watershed" is used for this sense, while elsewhere terms like "catchment" or "drainage area" are used. A drainage divide is the line that separates neighboring drainage basins. In English-speaking countries outside of North America, this is normally known as a "watershed".
A drainage divide, water divide, ridgeline, [1] watershed, water parting or height of land is elevated terrain that separates neighboring drainage basins. On rugged land, the divide lies along topographical ridges , and may be in the form of a single range of hills or mountains , known as a dividing range .
Watersheds may also be defined in the continuous domain. [1] There are also many different algorithms to compute watersheds. Watershed algorithms are used in image processing primarily for object segmentation purposes, that is, for separating different objects in an image. This allows for counting the objects or for further analysis of the ...