Headward erosion

Headward erosion is erosion at the origin of a stream channel, which causes the origin to move back away from the direction of the stream flow, and so causes the stream channel to lengthen. It can also refer to widening of a canyon by erosion along its very top edge, when sheets of water first enter the canyon from a more roughly planar surface above it, such as at Canyonlands National Park in Utah. (See image at right.) When sheets of water on a roughly planar surface first enter a depression in it, this erodes the top edge of the depression. This either causes the stream to grow longer at the very top of the stream, which moves its origin back, or causes the canyon formed by the stream to grow wider, by erosion along the length of its top side edge as sheets of water flow over the edge. Widening of the canyon by erosion inside the canyon, below the canyon side top edge, or origin or the stream, such as erosion caused by the streamflow inside it, is not called headwall erosion.