How many miles long is the San Joaquin River?
The 366-mile (589 km) long river starts in the high Sierra Nevada, and flows through the rich agricultural region of the northern San Joaquin Valley before reaching Suisun Bay, San Francisco Bay, and the Pacific Ocean.
Where does the Sacramento River meet the San Joaquin River?
Downstream of the city of Sacramento, the river converges with the San Joaquin River to form the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
What is the tributary of the Napa River?
It drains a famous wine-growing region called the Napa Valley, in the mountains north of the San Francisco Bay. Milliken Creek and Mt. Veeder watersheds are a few of its many tributaries. The river mouth is at Vallejo, where the intertidal zone of fresh and salt waters flow into the Carquinez Strait and the San Pablo Bay .
What is the history of the Sacramento River?
Sacramento River This gem is king of our rivers in Northern California. Beginning in the Klamath mountain, it runs 445 miles before its finish line at the San Francisco Bay and Delta. Since its creation it has been the home of hundreds of ancient American Indian tribes. The history here is probably more than we'll ever know.
What river runs through San Joaquin?
Where does the San Joaquin River flow?
How much water does the San Joaquin River have?
What is the average monthly flow of the San Joaquin River?
How many people lived in San Joaquin Valley?
How long has the San Joaquin Valley been inhabited?
What is the longest river in California?
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About this website
What river flows into San Francisco?
Tributary rivers that drain into the Bay include the Petaluma, Napa, Guadalupe Rivers, and numerous smaller creeks and streams. Historically, San Francisco Bay had about 300 square miles of tidal marsh with 6000 miles of channels and 12 square miles of shallow pan.
What's the river under the Golden Gate Bridge?
Golden GateGolden Gate Bridge / Body of waterThe Golden Gate Bridge is a suspension bridge spanning the Golden Gate, the one-mile-wide (1.6 km) strait connecting San Francisco Bay and the Pacific Ocean.
What bodies of water is San Francisco between?
San Francisco Bay, large, nearly landlocked bay indenting western California, U.S. It is a drowned river valley paralleling the coastline and is connected with the Pacific Ocean by a strait called the Golden Gate, which is spanned by the Golden Gate Bridge.
Does San Francisco have a river?
San Francisco has 48 celebrated hills, but no rivers flowing in the valleys between them. This wasn't always the case. Years ago numerous creeks and streams ran between the famously undulating topography, springing from the grassy hillsides and making their way to the ocean and the bay.
How deep is the water underneath the Golden Gate Bridge?
377 ft(Figure 1). The depth below the Golden Gate Bridge (purple shade) is 115 m (377 ft). Harding, Shag, and Arch rocks in the center of the Bay are shallower (11 m, 36 ft) than the bottom of large container and tanker ships (14 m, 46 ft) traveling in and out of San Francisco Bay.
How deep is the water around Alcatraz?
With that said though, the water surrounding Alcatraz is on the deeper end of the scale, but still, it's just an average depth of 43 feet.
Are there great white sharks in San Francisco Bay?
After a seven-year study, marine ecologists estimate there are around 266 great whites in the San Fransico Bay area. The sharks aren't particularly interested in humans as they have plenty of other prey species to keep them occupied.
Can you swim in San Francisco Bay?
Top 10 Places to Swim in San Francisco Bay. Our beloved bay isn't known as a swimmer's destination. But if you know where to look, you can find all kinds of sheltered coves, sandy beaches and picturesque parks right on the water and perfect for dipping a toe.
Why is the water in San Francisco Bay cold?
The water along the coast of California is cold for a couple of reasons. First, the California Current brings cold water from Alaska southward along the coast. And second, cold water from the deep ocean comes up to the surface through a process called upwelling.
Is San Francisco Bay saltwater or freshwater?
San Francisco Bay Overview The estuary contains salt water for more than 30 miles inland to the Carquinez Strait. From the other direction, fresh water from the Central Valley flows through the Delta to the sea, meeting salt water at a shifting point just past Carquinez.
Where does San Francisco get water from?
Our drinking water comes from a variety of protected sources carefully managed by the SFPUC. These sources include surface water stored in reservoirs located in the Sierra Nevada, Alameda County and San Mateo County, and groundwater supplies stored in a deep aquifer located in San Francisco and San Mateo counties.
What is the largest source of water for the city of San Francisco?
San Francisco draws its water from two major watersheds — the Tuolumne, which includes the Hetch Hetchy reservoir, Cherry Lake and Lake Eleanor, and the Alameda and Peninsula watersheds. Hetch Hetchy, a reservoir located in Yosemite National Park, provides about 85% of the city's water supply.
Is it salt water under the Golden Gate Bridge?
The quantity of salt water in motion between high and low tides averages 390 billion gallons. Water depth at the Golden Gate is more than 300 feet, but San Francisco Bay waters are, on average, just 14 feet deep. Thousands of animal species, including over 130 species of fish, call the bay home.
Why isn't the Golden Gate Bridge painted gold?
The Golden Gate Bridge has always been painted orange vermilion, deemed "International Orange." Rejecting carbon black and steel gray, Consulting Architect Irving Morrow selected the distinctive orange color because it blends well with the span's natural setting as it is a warm color consistent with the warm colors of ...
What are 5 facts about the Golden Gate Bridge?
5 Fun Facts About the Golden Gate BridgeThe bridge is actually not golden at all! It's a bright red-orange.It was named one of the Seven Wonders of the Modern World.It took four years to build.There are approximately 600,000 rivets in each of the bridge's towers.It's the most photographed bridge in the world.
How long will Golden Gate Bridge last?
The bridge, like other infrastructure, has a lifespan. But Bauer and Mohn say with proper maintenance, the Golden Gate Bridge will endure. The retrofit project alone will buy the span another 150 years, Bauer estimated.
Old River (California) - Wikipedia
The Old River is a tidal distributary of the San Joaquin River that flows for about 40 miles (64 km) through the Sacramento–San Joaquin River Delta in Northern California.The Old River was once the main channel of the San Joaquin until navigation (Stockton Deepwater Shipping Channel) and flood control projects in the late 19th and 20th century fixed the San Joaquin to its present course past ...
What is the name of the river that drains the Napa Valley?
Dry Creek, Napa Creek, Carneros Creek. The Napa River is a river approximately 55 miles (89 km) long in the U.S. state of California. It drains a famous wine-growing region called the Napa Valley, in the mountains north of the San Francisco Bay. Milliken Creek and Mt. Veeder watersheds are a few of its many tributaries.
Where does the Napa River flow?
The Napa River rises in northwestern Napa County just south of the summit of Mt. St. Helena in the Mayacamas Mountains of the California Coast Ranges. The source begins as seasonal Kimball Canyon Creek in Robert Louis Stevenson State Park at an elevation of 3,745 feet (1,141 m) which descends the southern slope of Mt. St. Helena to Kimball Canyon Dam. It flows south for 4 miles (6 km), entering the head of the slender Napa Valley north of Calistoga. In the valley, it flows southeast past Calistoga, St Helena, Rutherford, Oakville and through Napa, its head of navigation. Downstream from Napa, it forms a tidal estuary, entering Mare Island Strait, a narrow channel on the north end of San Pablo Bay. It discharges into San Pablo Bay through the Napa Sonoma Marsh .
What kind of salmon is in the Napa River?
Recently, a chum salmon ( Oncorhynchus keta) was caught in the river. In addition, a fourth salmon species, sockeye salmon ( Oncorhynchus nerka ), was also identified in the Napa River.
What fish are in the Napa River?
The river also supports a remarkable diversity of fishes and recovering salmonid populations, especially chinook salmon ( Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) and steelhead trout ( Oncorhynchus mykiss ). In 2003 the Napa County Resource Conservation District began an ongoing salmon monitoring program, and have recorded a run of approximately 400 - 1000 fall-run Chinook salmon the past several years. The Chinook run begins in late October through January. Conclusive evidence of historical chinook salmon populations in the Napa River basin have not been established, but the river provides appropriate habitat for salmon and its location near the entrance to the Sacramento / San Joaquin Rivers make it likely that salmon would have at least ventured into the Napa River. In 2013, a genetics study of Napa River chinook salmon revealed that two adults migrated from the Klamath River and successfully spawned in the Napa River, since four juvenile chinook collected from the Napa River in 2010 were proved to be siblings from the close similarity of their DNA and that the latter was characteristic of Klamath River chinook. These findings have important implications for the protection of the federally endangered Coastal California Chinook Salmon ESU since the Napa River, nor any stream in the Bay Area, was included in this ESU.
How big is the Napa River watershed?
Watershed. The Napa River watershed encompasses approximately 426 square miles (1,103 km²). Larger tributaries, such as Dry, Conn, and Soda creeks, show signs of recent incision and have graded to the incised current level of the mainstem Napa River.
When was the Napa River Flood Project completed?
The Project underwent a lengthy redesign and was approved by the local voters in 1998. Construction began in 2000 and was completed by 2015.
Where to whitewater kayak from San Pablo Bay?
Whitewater kayaking and rafting can be done on the upper section of river from St. Helena to Napa. The lower section of the Napa River from Napa to San Pablo Bay has flatwater that is suitable for canoeing, sea kayaking and motorboating.
Where is the San Francisco River?from naturalatlas.com
The San Francisco River is a 159-mile-long (256 km) river in the southwest United States , the largest tributary of the Upper Gila River. The river originates near Alpine, Arizona and flows into New Mexico before re-entering Arizona and joining the Gila downstream from Clifton, Arizona. River in AZ, NM.
What is the name of the river in Brazil?from naturalatlas.com
River. For the river in Brazil, see São Francisco River. For the river in Argentina, see San Francisco River (Argentina). In Ecuador, the Río San Francisco is a tributary of the Zamora River in Zamora-Chinchipe province. The San Francisco River is a 159-mile-long (256 km) river in the southwest United States, the largest tributary ...
Where does the water flow from San Francisco Bay to the sea?
Here, a portion of the water that would normally flow through San Francisco Bay to the sea is diverted via local, state and federal facilities to supply water to the San Francisco Bay area and central and southern California.
What are the two rivers that flow through Sacramento?
Downstream of the city of Sacramento, the river converges with the San Joaquin River to form the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. Here, a portion of the water that would normally flow through San Francisco Bay to the sea is diverted via local, state and federal facilities to supply water to the San Francisco Bay area and central and southern California. These two rivers receive water from many of the other significant river systems in the northern and central parts of the state. Together, they carry about 42 percent of the state’s average annual runoff and their waters support agricultural production, manufacturing and residential use throughout the state through pumping and diversions from the Delta.
What is the Sacramento River regulated by?
The headwaters of the Sacramento River and its main northern tributaries —the Pit and McCloud rivers — are regulated by Shasta Dam. Other major tributaries —the Feather and American rivers to the south —and smaller streams are heavily regulated by dams for flood control, water supply, power production and recreation.
What are the two major water projects in California?
The river and its tributaries are also home to some of the key dams and reservoirs of California’s two statewide water transfer and storage projects — the federal Central Valley Projec t and the State Water Project. The headwaters of the Sacramento River and its main northern tributaries —the Pit and McCloud rivers — are regulated by Shasta ...
How far does the Sacramento River go?
The river stretches some 384 miles from its headwaters near Mount Shasta to the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta . Meandering south through the Sacramento Valley, the river helps support the valley’s 2 million acres of irrigated agriculture.
What is the largest river in California?
California’s largest river, the Sacramento, provides 31 percent of the state’s surface water runoff. Once called “the Nile of the West,” the Sacramento River drains the inland slopes of the Klamath Mountains, the Cascade Range, the Coast Ranges and the western slopes of the northern Sierra Nevada. The river stretches some 384 miles ...
What are the crops grown in the Sacramento River?
The primary crops grown are rice, wheat, corn, alfalfa, deciduous orchard crops, tomatoes and other vegetables. Also home to wildlife and a range of aquatic species, the Sacramento River provides rearing habitat for 70 percent of all salmon caught off the California coast.
What river is the heart of San José?
The Guadalupe River and the Hidden Heart of San José. To hear Roger Castillo tell it, all of the City of San José—its million inhabitants, its sprawling residential neighborhoods, its glittery glass high-rises and office-park tech campuses—is more or less floating around on the backs of a bunch of salmon. This is not so implausible as it sounds.
Where is the Guadalupe River Trail?
At West Virginia Street the beginning of the Guadalupe River Trail is commemorated with a salmon bas-relief on a bridge and a sun-shape cut into the base of a balcony overlook. A shady hiking and biking trail leads north along the riverbank for about a quarter-mile through a eucalyptus grove.
How long is the Guadalupe River Park?
On signs dotting the riverwalk, the city labels the Guadalupe River Park & Gardens as a “2.6-mile-long oasis of discovery, peace and pleasure.”. It is close to achieving that feel. Since the main park opened in 2005, additional pieces have come online, like the Rotary play garden in 2015.
How many cubic feet per second of water does San José have?
San José is a river city, split neatly from north to south by the Guadalupe River, a 14-mile waterway that can flood with 14,000 cubic feet per second of water in the winter and shrink to mostly dust in the summer.
What is the riverside park?
It is surprising to contemplate the natural placidity of the ivy-tangled banks, the water and the ducks, and think of the human energy all around: The riverside park meanders around grassy lawns past the Children’s Discovery Museum and the San José Center for the Performing Arts.
Where did Castillo catch the Chinook?
A monster fish he rescued from a pump station near Great America is now taxidermied and hanging on the wall in his small office; in 1996 he caught a 30-inch Chinook in a drainage channel near the Norman Y. Mineta international airport. (“People don’t know the airport was built on top of the river system,” Castillo told me. “In wet years, the runway floats.”)
Where are the wild radish crowds in Santa Clara?
Willows, rushes, and wild radish crowd the Guadalupe River channel near the James Lick Mansion in Santa Clara. (Photo by Andrea Laue)
What river runs for 196 miles?
1. Eel River. flickr/kevin stevens. The Eel River runs for 196 miles, emptying in the Pacific Ocean. The water runoff in January and February is 100 times more than the summer months. Spanish explorers sailed this river in search of a passageway; instead they discovered "natives who were uncivilized.".
Which river did Jerry Garcia's father drown in?
Sad fact: Jerry Garcia's Father drowned here. 6. Sacramento River. This gem is king of our rivers in Northern California. Beginning in the Klamath mountain, it runs 445 miles before its finish line at the San Francisco Bay and Delta.
How high is the Tuolomne River?
The Tuolomne River begins at 8,000 feet above sea level. Over one million visitors head to this waterway each year to enjoy its pristine beauty. Many folks love to white water raft its 15 mile run. Wear a life vest, people!
What river runs through San Joaquin?
Past the head of tide, amid the many islands of the delta, the San Joaquin is joined by two more tributaries: the Calaveras River and the larger Mokelumne. The river grows to almost 5,000 ft (1,500 m) wide before ending at its confluence with the Sacramento River, in Antioch, forming the head of Suisun Bay.
Where does the San Joaquin River flow?
The majority of the river flows through quiet agricultural bottom lands , and as a result its meandering course manages to avoid most of the urban areas and cities in the San Joaquin Valley. About 11 mi (18 km) west of Modesto, the San Joaquin meets its largest tributary, the Tuolumne.
How much water does the San Joaquin River have?
The natural annual discharge of the San Joaquin before agricultural development is believed to have been between 6–7.9 million acre feet (7.4–9.7 million dam 3 ), equaling a flow of roughly 8,300 to 10,900 cu ft/s (240 to 310 m 3 /s). Some early estimates even range as high as 14 million acre-feet (17.3 million dam 3 ), or more than 19,300 cu ft/s (550 m 3 /s). The numerous tributaries of the San Joaquin – the Fresno, Chowchilla, Merced, Tuolumne, Mariposa Creek, Calaveras, Mokelumne, and others – flowed freely across alluvial flood plains to join the river. All of the major tributaries of the river originate in the Sierra Nevada; most of the streams that start in the Coast Range are intermittent, and contribute little to the flow of the San Joaquin. During the winter, spring, and early summer, storms and snowmelt swell the river; in 1914 – before the development of major dams and irrigation diversions – the California Department of Engineering estimated the river's flow in full flood at 325,000 cu ft/s (9,200 m 3 /s). In late summer and autumn, there is little water left over to replenish stream flow. Historically, groundwater seepage from Tulare Lake maintained a significant base flow in the river during the dry months – some accounts suggest over 50 percent.
What is the average monthly flow of the San Joaquin River?
The typical monthly flow of the San Joaquin River near the Sack Dam is 0 . There have been seepage concerns below this part of the river, so current flows are restricted below the Sack Dam.
How many people lived in San Joaquin Valley?
The native people, mostly hunter-gatherers, lived off this land of abundance; during the 18th century, the population of the San Joaquin Valley was estimated at more than 69,000, representing one of the greatest concentrations of native people anywhere in North America.
How long has the San Joaquin Valley been inhabited?
People have inhabited the San Joaquin Valley for more than 8,000 years, and it was long one of the major population centers of pre-Columbian California. Starting in the late 18th century, successive waves of explorers then settlers, mainly Spanish and American, emigrated to the San Joaquin basin, first exploiting then driving out the indigenous tribes. The newcomers quickly appropriated the rich natural and hydrologic resources of the watershed for use in farms and cities, but found themselves plagued by flood and drought. Because of the uniform topography of the San Joaquin Valley, floods once transformed much of the lower river into a huge inland sea .
What is the longest river in California?
The San Joaquin River ( / ˌsæn hwɑːˈkiːn /; Spanish: Río San Joaquín) is the longest river of Central California. The 366-mile (589 km) long river starts in the high Sierra Nevada, and flows through the rich agricultural region of the northern San Joaquin Valley before reaching Suisun Bay, San Francisco Bay, and the Pacific Ocean. An important source of irrigation water as well as a wildlife corridor, the San Joaquin is among the most heavily dammed and diverted of California's rivers.
Overview
Course
The river's source is located in the Ansel Adams Wilderness, in the south-central Sierra Nevada at the confluence of three major affluents: the Middle Fork, which rises from Thousand Island Lake at almost 10,000 ft (3,000 m) above sea level, meets the North Fork, which starts 1.8 mi (2.9 km) southeast of Mount Lyell, and the South Fork, which begins at Martha Lake in Kings Canyon National Park and …
Name
The river was called many different names; at times different parts of the river were known by different names. The present name of the river dates to 1805–1808, when Spanish explorer Gabriel Moraga was surveying east from Mission San José in order to find possible sites for a mission. Moraga named a tributary of the river (it is not known which one) for Saint Joachim, husband of Saint Anne and father of Mary, the mother of Jesus. The name Moraga chose was later applied t…
Geology
In a geologic context, the San Joaquin River can be divided into two major segments. The upper 97 mi (156 km) above Friant Dam in the Sierra is characterized as a steep-gradient, rocky mountain stream. Over millions of years, the upper San Joaquin, as well as the upper reaches of most of its tributaries, have eroded enormous amounts of rock and sediment from the mo…
History
Archaeological finds near the southern end of the San Joaquin Valley suggested that humans first arrived in the region as early as 12,000 but no later than 5,000 years ago. The two major ethnic groups were the Miwok people, who inhabited the northern end of the San Joaquin Valley and the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta region, and the Yokuts tribes, scattered around the more arid southern po…
Dams, diversions and engineering
By the early 20th century, Californian cities as far south as Los Angeles were looking to new sources for electricity because of their rapidly growing populations and industries. Two visionaries, railroad baron Henry E. Huntington and engineer John S. Eastwood established a fledgling power company in 1902 today known as Southern California Edison, and acquired water rights to the up…
Ecology and environment
Hundreds of years ago, the San Joaquin flowed freely through a grass and marsh-dominated region variously known as the "California prairie", "California annual grassland", or "Central Valley grasslands". It is widely believed that the dominant grass species throughout the San Joaquin River valley and Tulare Basin, as well as the Sacramento Valley, the Sierra foothills and Coast Ranges, …
Watershed
At 15,600 sq mi (40,000 km ), the San Joaquin River watershed proper drains a fair swath of inland central California, an area comparable to the size of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. If combined with the 16,200 sq mi (42,000 km ) Tulare Basin, which historically (and still rarely) experiences northerly outflow to the San Joaquin River, it would be the largest single drainage basin entirely in t…
Overview
The Napa River is a river approximately 55 miles (89 km) long in the U.S. state of California. It drains a famous wine-growing region called the Napa Valley, in the mountains north of the San Francisco Bay. Milliken Creek and Mt. Veeder watersheds are a few of its many tributaries. The river mouth is at Vallejo, where the intertidal zone of fresh and salt waters flow into the Carquinez Strait and the San …
Course
The Napa River rises in northwestern Napa County just south of the summit of Mt. St. Helena in the Mayacamas Mountains of the California Coast Ranges. The source begins as seasonal Kimball Canyon Creek in Robert Louis Stevenson State Park at an elevation of 3,745 feet (1,141 m) which descends the southern slope of Mt. St. Helena to Kimball Canyon Dam. It flows south for 4 miles (6 k…
Watershed
The Napa River watershed encompasses approximately 426 square miles (1,103 km²). Larger tributaries, such as Dry, Conn, and Soda creeks, show signs of recent incision and have graded to the incised current level of the mainstem Napa River. In some cases, smaller tributaries cutting across the valley floor have not fully adjusted to the lowered level of the mainstem and are elevated at their confluence with the mainstem, forming potential barriers to upstream fish migr…
Ecology
The river also supports a remarkable diversity of fishes and recovering salmonid populations, especially chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) and steelhead trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss). In 2003 the Napa County Resource Conservation District began an ongoing salmon monitoring program, and have recorded a run of approximately 400 - 1000 fall-run Chinook salmon the past s…
Restoration
As part of urban renewal in the 1970s, a concrete cover was removed from culverted sections of the Napa Creek, re-exposing the water to daylight. There is some debate as to whether this constituted one of the country's earliest "daylighting" projects, since the construction was undertaken with little thought to the river's ecology or restoration of riparian habitat. This construction is not believed to be responsible for later flooding along the river.
Napa Flood of 1986
In 1986, the worst of 23 floods recorded since 1865 on the Napa River occurred. 5,000 people were evacuated, 250 homes were destroyed, and three people lost their lives.
After the devastating flood of 1986, the dormant Napa River Flood Project was revitalized. The Project underwent a lengthy redesign and was approved by the local voters in 1998. Construction began in 2000 and was completed by 2015.
Recreation
The Napa River and the surrounding watershed provide many recreational opportunities. Whitewater kayaking and rafting can be done on the upper section of river from St. Helena to Napa. The lower section of the Napa River from Napa to San Pablo Bay has flatwater that is suitable for canoeing, sea kayaking and motorboating. The Napa River Trail has segments at Kennedy Park (N 38.2676…
See also
• List of rivers of California
• List of watercourses in the San Francisco Bay Area