The Water Cycle

  

 This cycle is made up of a few main parts 

1. evaporation
2. condensation
3. precipitation
4. Collection      

Evaporation: 

Evaporation is when the sun heats up water in rivers or lakes or the ocean and turns it into vapor or steam. 

Evaporation

Condensation:  

Water vapor in the air gets cold and changes back into liquid, forming clouds. This is called condensation.

Condensation

Precipitation: 

Precipitation occurs when so much water has condensed that the air cannot hold it anymore.  The clouds get heavy and water falls back to the earth in the form of rain, hail, sleet or snow.

Precipitation

Collection

When water falls back to earth as precipitation, it may fall back in the oceans, lakes or rivers or it may end up on land. 

Collection

How the Water Cycle Works

Solar energy evaporates exposed water from seas, lakes, rivers, and wet soils; the majority of this evaporation takes place over the seas. Water is also released into the atmosphere by the plants through photosynthesis. During this process, known as evapotranspiration water vapour rises into the atmosphere.

Clouds form when air becomes saturated with water vapour. The two major types of cloud formation are stratified or layered grey cloud called stratus, and billowing white or dark grey cloud called cumulus. Nimbostratus clouds and cumulonimbus clouds are the two cloud types that are associated with rainy weather; nimbostratus clouds will bring steady rain, and cumulonimbus clouds will bring stormy weather.

Precipitation as rain or hail ensures that water return to Earth’s surface in a fresh form. Some of this rain, however, falls into the seas and is not accessible to human. When rain falls, it either washes down hill slopes or seeps underground; when snow and hail melt, this water may also sink into the ground.

Rain fall also replenishes river water supplies, as does underground water. Snow fall may consolidate into glaciers and ice sheets which, when they melt, release their water into the ground, into stream or into the seas.

(source: Geographica’s Pocket World Preference, 2001)