The Einasleigh River is a
river
A river is a natural flowing watercourse, usually freshwater, flowing towards an ocean, sea, lake or another river. In some cases, a river flows into the ground and becomes dry at the end of its course without reaching another body of wate ...
in
Far North Queensland
Far North Queensland (FNQ) is the northernmost part of the Australian state of Queensland. Its largest city is Cairns and it is dominated geographically by Cape York Peninsula, which stretches north to the Torres Strait, and west to the Gulf C ...
, Australia. When combined with the
Gilbert River, the river system is the largest river system in northern Australia.
Course and features
The Einasleigh River rises in the locality of
Lyndhurst in the
Einasleigh Uplands
The Einasleigh Uplands is an interim Australian bioregion, with vegetation consisting of savanna and woodland located on a large plateau in inland Queensland, Australia. It corresponds to the Einasleigh Uplands savanna ecoregion, as identified ...
within the
Atherton Tableland
The Atherton Tableland is a fertile plateau which is part of the Great Dividing Range in Queensland, Australia.
The principal river flowing across the plateau is the Barron River. It was dammed to form an irrigation reservoir named Lake Tina ...
, draining the western slopes of the
Great Dividing Range
The Great Dividing Range, also known as the East Australian Cordillera or the Eastern Highlands, is a cordillera system in eastern Australia consisting of an expansive collection of mountain ranges, plateaus and rolling hills, that runs rough ...
below Mount Remarkable. The river flows generally north, northwest and then west. The river is joined by 33
tributaries
A tributary, or affluent, is a stream or river that flows into a larger stream or main stem (or parent) river or a lake. A tributary does not flow directly into a sea or ocean. Tributaries and the main stem river drain the surrounding drainage b ...
from source to
mouth
In animal anatomy, the mouth, also known as the oral cavity, or in Latin cavum oris, is the opening through which many animals take in food and issue vocal sounds. It is also the cavity lying at the upper end of the alimentary canal, bounded on ...
including the
Copperfield and
Etheridge rivers and numerous creeks before reaching its
confluence
In geography, a confluence (also: ''conflux'') occurs where two or more flowing bodies of water join to form a single channel. A confluence can occur in several configurations: at the point where a tributary joins a larger river (main stem); o ...
with the Gilbert River north of . The Einasleigh River has a
catchment area
In human geography, a catchment area is the area from which a location, such as a city, service or institution, attracts a population that uses its services and economic opportunities. Catchment areas may be defined based on from where people are ...
of . Following its confluence, the Gilbert River spills into a vast
estuarine
An estuary is a partially enclosed coastal body of brackish water with one or more rivers or streams flowing into it, and with a free connection to the open sea. Estuaries form a transition zone between river environments and maritime environment ...
delta approximately wide
that largely consists of tidal flats and
mangrove
A mangrove is a shrub or tree that grows in coastal saline water, saline or brackish water. The term is also used for tropical coastal vegetation consisting of such species. Mangroves are taxonomically diverse, as a result of convergent evoluti ...
swamp
A swamp is a forested wetland.Keddy, P.A. 2010. Wetland Ecology: Principles and Conservation (2nd edition). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK. 497 p. Swamps are considered to be transition zones because both land and water play a role in ...
s across the
Gulf Country
The Gulf Country is the region of woodland and savanna grassland surrounding the Gulf of Carpentaria in north western Queensland and eastern Northern Territory on the north coast of Australia. The region is also called the Gulf Savannah. It ...
. The Einasleigh River descends over its
course.
[
East of the river is crossed by the ]Einasleigh River Bridge
The Einasleigh River Bridge is a road bridge over the Einasleigh River on the Gulf Developmental Road, in the Far North Queensland, Australia, located east of Georgetown and west of Mount Surprise. The bridge is part of the only sealed (asp ...
that carries the Gulf Developmental Road
Gulf Developmental Road is an Australian highway linking the Cairns and Normanton regions in northern Queensland, Australia. It is the only sealed (asphalt) road linking these two regions.
In the east, the road begins at an unnamed junction o ...
.
The Einasleigh River is a seasonal stream and discharge can vary greatly depending on the intensity of the monsoon
A monsoon () is traditionally a seasonal reversing wind accompanied by corresponding changes in precipitation but is now used to describe seasonal changes in atmospheric circulation and precipitation associated with annual latitudinal oscil ...
. When combined with the Gilbert River, the Einasleigh River has the sixth-highest discharge of any river in Australia, slightly less than that of the Potomac in North America. In an intense wet season
The wet season (sometimes called the Rainy season) is the time of year when most of a region's average annual rainfall occurs. It is the time of year where the majority of a country's or region's annual precipitation occurs. Generally, the sea ...
, however, the discharge can be as large as that of 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 ...
in Canada, and in a mild wet season like that of 1951–52, the discharge can be as little as one tenth of the long term mean
There are several kinds of mean in mathematics, especially in statistics. Each mean serves to summarize a given group of data, often to better understand the overall value (magnitude and sign) of a given data set.
For a data set, the ''arithme ...
. It is estimated that runoff from the combined Gilbert-Einasleigh River system totals about 2.2 percent of the total runoff from Australia.[
]
See also
*
References
{{Rivers of Queensland
Rivers of Far North Queensland