Talk:River

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Contents

[edit] WikiProject Ecoregions

GAYBOD! GAYBOD!


I don't see the connection between this entry and the Ecoregions WikiProject. Yes, rivers are significant features of ecoregions, but I don't see how Wikipedia:WikiProject Ecoregions makes any recommendations on the formatting or content of either the river entry or the entries for particular rivers. Jimbreed 14:57, Aug 14, 2003 (UTC)

[edit] Rivers in fiction?

This list seems unnecessary to me, as there seems to be no algorithm which would allow for anyone to figure out which rivers, and in what fiction, would be acceptable for inclusion. Could we also include the Thames that was shown in that James Bond movie? Hopefully not (it's in there three times already...). I'm sure there are thousands of real rivers mentioned in fiction, or shown in movies (also fiction), and this information isn't truly germane to the topic (nor will many readers of the article find it very interesting/informative). I do however, believe that the Mythological Rivers entry is important, but a line must be drawn, as I wouldn't consider the canon of Zelda to be yet at the stage of mythology. The Greek rivers are necessary for the topic, though. Comments? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 142.25.141.158 (talk) 05:04, 14 December 2006 (UTC).

SECONDED. Other users? Should we remove some from the list? Chris b shanks 15:46, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Why do most rivers flow north?

I recently got asked a question "why do most rivers flow north" and couldn't find an answer in Wikipedia. But there are some on the Web. Looks like it's a common misconception out there. Maybe include some passages about this based on this: on tinyurl dot com: zudto and njh3k (or just search google for "why do rivers flow north"

How bizarre. I googled for that, half expecting to find some convoluted explanation to do with Coriolis effect or something, but no, this is actually just people being stupid. hehehe.
Amazingly 'worldatlas.com' (up there in the google results) states "The vast percentage of rivers on the planet flow in a southerly direction" What? w.. w... why?? It goes on to explain that in fact sometimes rivers do flow North because northwards can be downhill too. Wow! Really? ...and Southwards is more commonly downhill is it? ...Stupid. I'll email them. -- Nojer2 15:28, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
I think it's not uncommon for people to think of north as map-up and south as map-down and then jump to mistaken conclusions without thinking about it very hard, relating north and up. Maybe it is mainly a mistake made by schoolkids and the reminder that north can be downhill is intended for kids. As for "the vast percentage of rivers on the planet" flowing south, that is also a common misconception. Most rivers do not flow directly south, north, east, or west, but wander around over their length. Some flow vaguely in one of the four cardinal directions, which raises the question, how directly south must a river flow to count as "flowing south". Depending on how you define "flows south" your percentage of rivers flowing south will change tremendously. In other words, these kind of stats and claims are rather arbitrary. Also, there are a great many rivers that flow generally north. Thousands and probably tens of thousands. Finally, there is another arbitrary aspect to these kind of claims. The term "river" doesn't have a strict definition. There are hundreds of rivers in England, for example, that flow generally north, but which would probably be called creeks in the United States. Thus the whole basis of "most rivers flow in X direction" falls apart for a whole range of reasons.
On the other hand, it may be that fewer major rivers in the North America flow north than they do east, west, and south. There coriolis effect seems highly unlikely to be involved. I'd put my money on the particular shape of the continent, wide in the north and narrow in the south, with large gulfs like the Gulf of Mexico lying to the south of broad plains bound by mountains to the east and west clear to the arctic. In contrast, if you look at Europe and especially Russia, you'll find an awful lot of rivers flowing north for the same reason - ocean in the north, mountains in the south, land extending wide east and west.
Sorry to go on, pet peeve! One of my wikipedia missions is to remove from river articles claims like "..River X is one of the only rivers in the world that flows north.." There are a surprising number of such claims on wikipedia. Pfly 03:25, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Yes this is becoming a pet peeve of mine too. I emailed worldatlas.com eight months ago, and again about a month ago. No response. They still have a page saying "The vast percentage of rivers on the planet flow in a southerly direction". It ranks so highly in google. I'm imagining all the school kids reading it and learning from it *sigh* -- Harry Wood 15:28, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Define 'river basin'

I suggest write the deffinition of river basin : the territory that recieves originally the river water. Mac 18:24 Mar 10, 2003 (UTC)

[edit] longest river

The River article says that the Nile is the longest, but the Nile article says that the Amazon is the longest.

The Nile article now explains this better (could be longer than the Amazon. Depends how you measure it). I've fixed this article accordingly. The small list of top ten longest rivers shows the Amazon being longer, just because that's how the numerical estimates seem to pan out. But I've added a little more explanation -- Nojer2 23:26, 5 Dec 2004 (UTC)
I'm confused. The River article now says that the Amazon is the longest, but the Nile article still says that the Nile is considered the longest, while the Amazon River article agrees that the Nile is the longest...
As it has been stated that people seldom agree due to uncertainty as to where to take measurements from, etc. (and, of course, national pride will always be at stake) why don't we just stick with the old "schoolboy" fact - The Nile is the longest, Amazon second?--JohnO 02:21, 27 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Yenisei

Okay, how come Yenisei did not make the list of the 10 longest rivers on this page? With the length of 5560 (4506) km listed in the Longest_rivers article, it deserves to be here. I have not made the edit, as I don't know what I'm doing, but someone please pay attention to it!

  • I really don't know about that top ten. It doesn't make sense that it is so different from the list of longest rivers. I'm going to copy the info from the list to this page. --Apyule 01:48, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Differences in length

I saw differences in the length of Amazon river in the article "List of River by length", and this one, and perhaps are other differences in other articles about other rivers. Although it is said everywhere that it is difficult to measure the length of a river, I think that there must be an agreement in an encyclopedia and give only one for each river (with the corresponding source), specially in lists.


[edit] ranked by volume of flow

This is on my wishlist -- a list of rivers ranked by how much water that flows from them. I think this is probably more useful than a rank by length... Geo Swan 01:15, 20 Dec 2004 (UTC)

It changes a lot, so it is difficult to get hard data. Encarta says the amazon discharges between 34 million and 121 million litres a year, but you see that is a wide range. Also human activites have greatly changed river volume. Do you mean Before or after the Aswan dam? Zeimusu 02:04, 2004 Dec 20 (UTC)
Hmmm. Good point. I'd still like to see estimates, or a rough ranking... Geo Swan 19:11, 20 Dec 2004 (UTC)


[edit] Well known rivers?

Shouldn't there be 1 line of explanation after each river to defend "well-known" status? - maveric149

Only a year late! A couple seemed not to have any one-liner for significance, makes them candidates to drop if no one objects. - Stan Shebs 05:36 Feb 21, 2003 (UTC)

Does the list of well known rivers serve any purpose except as POV flamebait? It should probably be offloaded (or eliminated). - Americasroof 20:40, 30 July 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Photos of rivers

The two photos of rivers are both from Australia, and both look pretty similar. How about we replace one of them with a completely different kind of river photo. e.g. big mountainous valley with a river. -- Nojer2 23:29, 5 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Your wish is my command. (ok so it's a little mountainous valley) Zeimusu 01:54, 2004 Dec 20 (UTC)
I would suggest that to be encylopædic, it would be useful to have photos of the main stages of a river (torrential, youthful, middle reaches meandering and estuary/ delta) . I can probably supply at least some of these, but I would welcome comments on the principle of how this article should be illustrated before going ahead. Velela 08:57, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
Yeah good idea. Basically I think we should go for good variety in the photos. At the moment we have some variety, including encyclopedic illustration of some mentioned river features. But a bit lacking in quality I feel. Good well composed photos with high-contrast (sunshine!) make for a better article presentation. This is why I've just swapped in Image:River gambia Niokolokoba National Park.gif at the top there. -- Nojer2 15:30, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
The photos have become a real mess again with several adding very little to the understanding of a river and no sense of order or significance to the sections within which they occur. At least one, judging from its constant re-instatement, appears to be a vanity item for its creator. I would happily try and restore some more encyclopaedic order as we discussed above in 2006 if there was a consensus. Any thoughts ? Velela (talk) 20:16, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Mouth

The article defines the mouth of a river as where it flows into the sea. But one of the picture captions speaks of the mouth as where the river emerges from the glacier. Could this photo be recaptioned?


[edit] River Definition

I thought I heard in grade school that the definition of a river was a stream of water of more than X feet in width. 50 seems like the proper value, but after traveling outside the western U.S., 25 seems more likely. Googling and looking at several references (Merriam-Webster, Britanica, ask.com, etc.) reveal that a river is a "big" stream. Does someone have a more useful definition? EncMstr 00:39, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

I guess it all depends on your perspective. In the UK a formal definition of a river first(?) arose in The Rivers prevention of pollution Acts 1951 - 1961 where a river is defined as any watercourse which is flowing at any time during the year (not the precise legal definition, but that is what the words mean !). This definition therefore includes seasonal rivers and all streams, becks, rills, bournes, gulleys, nants etc. I guess other countries and outher juristictions may have other views. In reality in the UK, most rivers are a few feet across but some named rivers are small enough to jump over! Velela 08:33, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
Here in the USA I have always heard that for it to be a river it must be 100 miles long or more. In recent travels in Europe I found out that isn't the standard there. I would like to see a section in this article to mention that and list for different areas of the world what the definitions are.-Crunchy Numbers 15:33, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Here are several officially-named U.S. rivers which are less than 100 miles: D River (120 feet), Roe River (201 feet), Hood River (10 to 25 miles) and the Coquille River (35 miles). 100 miles would not seem to be the standard here either.
I've been looking for the definition of a river since a while back. Many web searches seem to confirm there is little in the way of a concrete definition or consensus. —EncMstr 16:14, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Boundary between sea and river

To complete the article 'pole of inaccessibility' I need some info on how to define the limit between river and ocean at river mouths. Where does the river end in an estuary? Where does the ocean start? Where to draw the coastline? Any kind of documentation or hints on this would really help, thanks. Post answers at my user page: User_talk:Andres72 or in the article itself. Andres72 22:30 21 mar 2007 (CET)

[edit] A river draining into the ground

How do you call a river which just disappeares into the ground? I can't seem to find a proper English term. --Dijxtra 18:58, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Depends on which you mean:
  • underground river: a river within the earth
  • riverbed: an empty channel or depression where a river flowed—and might again if water returns
  • terminus: (english adopted from latin) where the river seems to end, by flowing underground, irrigation draws and/or evaporation
—EncMstr 19:28, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
Treminus would be it. But, does the term terminus mean "a place where a river goes uderground" or "a river which ends by going uderground"? --Dijxtra 19:54, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
Terminus is the apparent end of the river as seen by the casual observer. (Like the terminus of a glacier: is the low end where it needs to extended to be advancing or shrink to be receding.) Terminus isn't associated with a specific cause of the river "ending"; just seeming to. Other words which might apply for the point at which it ends, depending on how it happens:
  • drain: like in a kitchen sink
  • suck hole: forceful suction
  • waterfall: like Niagara Falls
  • lake: a stagnant body of water
—EncMstr 23:28, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
Good, just as I thought. Now, is there a term in English which denotes a river that ends in terminus? Is it just "a river that ends in terminus" or is there a single word for it? --Dijxtra 05:30, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
Check out the article and external links for Mojave River. It appears and disappears several times over its course. There isn't really any special word or name for such a thing, but disappearing river will do, even though it's ambiguous. (It could mean over time, like the Aral Sea.) —EncMstr 17:08, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

In karst areas, a stream that goes underground into a cave system or a sinkhole is termed a disappearing stream. Vsmith 12:51, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Thank you very much, both of you. The thing is that in my language we have a word for such a river, so it was natural for me that English should have it to, that's why I was so puzzled to discover the speciffic term doesn't exist... --Dijxtra

[edit] Topography

I cannot quite make sense of the opening sentence of this section (my italics):

A river conducts water by constantly flowing perpendicular to the elevation curve of its bed, thereby converting the potential energy of the water into kinetic energy.

I am tempted to replace ‘perpendicular’ (i.e. ‘normal’) by its antonym (i.e. ‘tangent’): after all, the elevation curve of a nearly-horizontal river-bed would seem to have a nearly vertical perpendicular but (according to common sense) result in a nearly horizontal direction of water-flow. But (geography was probably my worst school subject!) I am aware that it is very possible that I have have hold of the wrong end of the Pooh-stick.

Can anyone edit so as to enlighten geographically challenged readers like me? —Ian Spackman 12:49, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

I really don't like this first sentence either. Since you looked at it someone changed it very strangely and then someone else made it even worse. I've tried to put it back but it all sounds like gobbledigook to me and I teach the subject. Perhaps someone could improve it. I also don't like this random list of rivers. SuzanneKn 21:23, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Strahler Stream Order

The Strahler Stream Order by definition requires that first order streams be perennial so I took out the added sentence that says it includes ephemral. Americasroof 18:19, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Topography & Geological Age

I have serious doubts about the accuracy of the information in the ostensible "Topography" section of this article. Besides the fact that it doesn't jive with what I've learned over the years (e.g., the New River has no floodplain at all, yet is one of the oldest rivers in the world), it just seems to be overly simplistic and even plain wrong. I'd like to see some documentation in this section, or at least a better explanation by a real geologist. Unschool 01:40, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Flooding and Crap

This article is crap. This is such a poorly written monstrosity that someone needs to come in and clean it up. It has a bunch of near-random lists, questionable info that is not cited (see writer above), and nonsensical grammar. From the "Flooding" section: In wintertime, rivers can be apart, it can lead to flash flooding downstream. What is this crap? Did we turn this article over to Mrs. Smith's 3rd grade class? 216.199.161.66 20:51, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Edits to lead

I didn't add the edits to glacial meltwater, but I did fix the links to them. It is worthy to mention this as a source, as it has a major impact to the quantity and quality of river flows. Correct, it was precipitation at one point, however that is not the point. Glaciers are reservoirs of precipitation, and can store for 1 to 10000 years. They release meltwater when temperatures fluctuate. (Similarly, groundwater is a reservoir that stores and releases a major quantity of water into rivers). Some of the science in the lead paragraph was also a bit off and misleading (e.g., it is wrong to think that rivers get their source directly from precipitation). +mwtoews 00:21, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

The original form of wording was created to simplify what had become a very messy and disorganised page a few months ago. The opening paragraph is intended to set the scene and in this context all river water originally starts as precipitation. In Origins of river water just below are set out the various physical sources that river water may have. If we add glacial melt water in the opening paragraph then we should also add mires and bogs ( a very substantial source of river water in Scotland for example), or summer storms (important in Australia) or chalk and limestone aquifers (vital in parts of France, Spain and Mexico for example) and so it could go on. What is an important source of river water depends on where you are and which rivers are perceived to be more important. I guess in Canada glaciers are important. To cut through all of that the original paragraph was conceived as a very simple statement of truth - all river water comes from precipitation. Velela 08:39, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
Yeah, I see the edits were a bit disorganized. I've edited the lead once more, and removed the odd-ball ones into a new (but I hope temporary) section. Please add to the lead, or edit what I've added. (Keep in mind that the simplified version is at simple:River—I would hope most people reading this article know what a river is and want to learn something new). The lead is a bit biased towards the physical hydrology side (because that's what I do), but it should probably also mention a few other important things, such as forming geopolitical boarders and the such.+mwtoews 18:43, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Initial picture

The picture at the head of the article isn't currently very clear: it's dark and rocks obscure the actual river. I'd suggest this image of the Amazon or this one of the Thames. The article lacks both a satellite image or map of a river, and one showing bridges and generally how humans react to rivers. I personally prefer the Thames one myself, but I'd like to see what others think. Laïka 16:14, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Amazon the longest?

I reverted an IP editor for changing the Amazon to the longest river, but check these out:

there are several other news stories about the same expedition to be found on Google News.

Seems the geographers aren't yet in perfect agreement. So, should we make the change? —Elipongo (Talk contribs) 01:20, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Addendum, seems there's already a discussion about this at Talk:Amazon River#Longest River?—Elipongo (Talk contribs) 19:32, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Well-known rivers (in alphabetic order)

As have many editors before me, I have removed some obviously less notable rivers (The Gavenny in Abergavenney is hardley more than a ditch !). I would urge that we stick to the principal river in each country (and perhaps a very few principal rivers for large countries) as judged by their size. I would also entertain major rivers running through capital cities as being notable but not much else. Velela 20:12, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Vandalism

This page seems to be getting a lot of vandalism. Anyone have any idea why this might be? Would it be appropriate to lock it for a while? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Readin (talk • contribs) 03:33, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Conflicting statements

The Ob River article describes the river as the fourth longest in Russia. However, the River article describes it as the fifth longest in the world. If the four longest in the world are the Nile, Amazon, Yangtze and Mississippi...where do the first three longest rivers in Russia fit? 216.195.199.146 (talk) 21:26, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Requested section: classification as a "RIVER"

I would be most appreciative if someone with proper knowledge and sources could add a section explaining how a body of water gets classified as a "RIVER" officially instead of, say, a "creek" or a "stream." Thanks in advance. 67.78.224.57 (talk) 19:32, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

There is no simple official way of categorizing some streams as rivers and others as creeks, etc, as far as I know. People just called them by the term that seems right to them. Official naming authorities almost always just affirm the existing usage. Still, something could be said about how the terms tend to be used. I'll see if I can find some decent info on the topic. Pfly (talk) 19:55, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
Ok, I made some edits to the opening in hopes of maker this stuff clearer, pointing out that there is no general rule about what can be called a river, even though some sources make claims like "larger than a creek". Also I removed the link to waterway because not all rivers are navigable, and used stream instead. The stream page points out that the term is used as an umbrella term used in the scientific community for all flowing natural waters, regardless of size. Other rewording, like linking to freshwater. I almost just wrote that rivers are freshwater, but perhaps there are some things called "river" that are salt water. I can't think of one offhand though. Also, even though most definitions say that a river flows into the ocean, a lake, or another stream, there are rivers that simply sink into the ground (like Lost River (Cacapon River) and Lost River (Idaho)) or dry up completely (like the Okavango River). I hope these edits help. Pfly (talk) 22:06, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] rivers

rivers have a upper course and a lower course the upper course is where mostly the river starts and works it's way down and other rivers would emerge this is where electric comes in and helps the flow of the river the kinetic energy the more power. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.100.94.17 (talk) 20:25, 23 April 2008 (UTC)