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Rivers are closely related to climate, and the hydrogeomorphic features and stability of river channels respond sensitively to climatic change. However, the history of instrumental observations of climatic, hydrological and channel changes is short, notably limiting our ability to understand the complex river responses to long-term climate change and human activity. In this study, we show that cave stalagmite records reflected the variations in precipitation and temperature in the Yellow River basin, and the net primary productivity (NPP) of vegetation over the past 1800years can therefore be reconstructed. We found that the reconstructed annual mean precipitation (P-m) and NPP closely related to the 1800-year variation of the lower Yellow River (LYR) channel instability indexed by the frequency of the LYR levee breaching events (LBEs) (F-b) derived from historical documents. The temporal variations in P-m, NPP and F-b exhibited an anti-phase relationship (negative correlation) and in-phase relationship (positive correlation), referred to as Type I and Type II relationships, respectively. The two types alternately appeared, dividing the studied period into several sub-periods. Type I occurred when the vegetation remained in a quasi-natural condition, and Type II occurred when the vegetation had been altered by humans to some degree. These features reflect complex river behaviours in response to climate change and human activity and may be explained by the interaction between climate, vegetation and human activity on the millennial timescale. (c) 2018 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.