The Chilko River is a river in the

Chilcotin District The Chilcotin () region of British Columbia is usually known simply as "the Chilcotin", and also in speech commonly as "the Chilcotin Country" or simply Chilcotin. It is a plateau and mountain region in British Columbia on the inland lee of the Co ...

of the

Central Interior of British Columbia Central is an adjective usually referring to being in the center of some place or (mathematical) object. Central may also refer to: Directions and generalised locations * Central Africa, a region in the centre of Africa continent, also known as ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

, flowing northeast from

Chilko Lake Chilko may refer to: *Chilko River The Chilko River is a river in the Chilcotin District of the Central Interior of British Columbia, Canada, flowing northeast from Chilko Lake to the Chilcotin River. Its main tributary is the Taseko River. Th ...

to the

Chilcotin River The Chilcotin River /tʃɪlˈkoʊtɪn/ located in Southern British Columbia, Canada is a long tributary of the Fraser River. The name Chilcotin comes from Tŝilhqot’in, meaning "ochre river people," where ochre refers to the mineral used by ...

. Its main tributary is the

Taseko River The Taseko River or Dasiqox in the original Chilcotin, is a tributary of British Columbia's Chilko River, a tributary of the Chilcotin River which joins the Fraser near the city of Williams Lake. The Taseko has its origins at Taylor Pass in ...

. The Chilko is the Chilcotin River's main tributary. In fact at their confluence the Chilko River is much larger than the Chilcotin. It is also the main reason why the lower reaches of the Chilcotin are very silty. The Chilko gets most of its

silt Silt is granular material of a size between sand and clay and composed mostly of broken grains of quartz. Silt may occur as a soil (often mixed with sand or clay) or as sediment mixed in suspension with water. Silt usually has a floury feel when ...

from the Taseko River, which joins it a few kilometers above the Chilko's mouth.

Name origin

The name "Chilko" is the product of linguistic anglicisation of the Tŝilhqot’in name ''Tŝilhqóx'', (also spelled without vowel flattening as ''Tsilhqox''). The meaning of the name is contested, and is the subject of much folk etymologising. Some believe the meaning to be "ochre river", but other contenders are "axe river" (from ''tŝinlh yeqox''), "river from the ponderosa pine" (from ''tsilhtsilh yeqox''), or "river with rocks" (from ''tŝi belh yeqox''). The related name of the Chilcotin River is from that of the Tŝilhqot’in First Nation, from ''Tŝilhqox Gwet’in'', meaning "people of Tŝilhqox". The name ''Tŝilhqox'' refers to the whole Chilko River as well as lower Chilcotin River, with its source at the north end of

and its mouth at its confluence with the

Fraser River The Fraser River is the longest river within British Columbia, Canada, rising at Fraser Pass near Blackrock Mountain in the Rocky Mountains and flowing for , into the Strait of Georgia just south of the City of Vancouver. The river's annual d ...

. Due to a confused naming process, the name "

" refers to only the lower segment of ''Tŝilhqox'', then follows a smaller tributary (''Cheẑqox''/Chezacut River) northwest to Chilcotin Lake (''Cheẑich’ed Biny''/Chezacut Lake), and then further north and west along another tributary (''Yeqox Gunchagh'' or "big creek" in Tŝilhqot’in) to its nominal source.

References

{{Reflist Tributaries of the Fraser River Rivers of the Chilcotin Cariboo Land District

Name origin

See also

References