Environmental changes are impacting river systems worldwide. These arise from factors such as flood magnitude-frequency changes, direct human management interventions, inadvertent human impacts on sediment supply and fluvial regimes and landscape-scale changes in climate. Historical and active metal mining is significant in this regard. Here, we investigate morphodynamic changes within a reach of the River Ystwyth, Wales, since 1845. We analyse historical and contemporary information derived from maps, river flow records , metal analyses of sediment samples (1970s and 2021), ground geomorphological surveys (1970s and 1986-1987) and remotely sensed imagery to investigate changes during a period of active metal mining followed by a century of post-mining recovery. During the studied period, an initially meandering river was transformed into a braided one, subse-