Blackwater river

A blackwater river is a type of a river with a deep, slow-moving channel flowing through forested swamps or wetlands. As vegetation decays, tannins leach into the water, making a transparent, acidic water that is darkly stained, resembling tea or black coffee. Most major blackwater rivers are in the Amazon Basin and the Southern United States. The term is used in fluvial studies, geology, geography, ecology, and biology. Not all dark rivers are blackwater in that technical sense. Some rivers in temperate regions, which drain or flow through areas of dark black loam, are simply black due to the color of the soil; these rivers are black mud rivers. There are also black mud estuaries.

Blackwater rivers are lower in nutrients than whitewater rivers and have ionic concentrations higher than rainwater. The unique conditions lead to flora and fauna that differ both from whitewater and clearwater rivers. Where the water types combine is attractive to a diverse group of organisms. The classification of Amazonian rivers into black, clear and whitewater was first proposed by Alfred Russel Wallace in 1853.

Blackwater River

A blackwater river is a river with a deep, slow-moving channel flowing through forested swamps or wetlands.

Blackwater River may also refer to:

Canada

Ireland

New Zealand

United Kingdom

Blackwater River (Missouri)

The Blackwater River is a 79.3-mile-long (127.6 km)tributary of the Lamine River in west-central Missouri in the United States. Via the Lamine and Missouri rivers, it is part of the watershed of the Mississippi River. The Blackwater River was named from the character of its banks and water. The Blackwater River is 16 miles longer than the Lamine River, of which it is a tributary.

Course

The Blackwater River is formed by short north and south forks in Johnson County about 6 miles (10 km) northwest of Warrensburg and flows generally east-northeastwardly through Johnson, Pettis, Saline and Cooper counties, past the towns of Sweet Springs and Blackwater. It flows into the Lamine River in northwestern Cooper County, about 4 miles (6.4 km) southeast of Blackwater.

The North Fork of the Blackwater starts as one to three springs in the southwestern corner of Lafayette County near the small village of Chapel Hill, about 7 miles (11 km) south of Bates City and about 29 miles (47 km) southeast of Kansas City.