The White River is a small and discontinuous river located in southeastern

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, Western region of the United States. It is bordered by Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. N ...

notable for several endemic species of

fish Fish are aquatic, craniate, gill-bearing animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish as well as various extinct related groups. Approximately 95% of li ...

. The river was named for F. A. White, a 19th-century explorer.

Course

The White River begins at the

Great Basin Divide The Great Basin Divide in the western United States is the ridgeline that separates the Great Basin from the Pacific Ocean watershed, which completely surrounds it. The Great Basin is the largest set of contiguous endorheic watersheds of N ...

in the White Pine Range near Ely, where it is fed by snowmelt and springs from Currant Mountain. It passes by the towns of Preston and Lund, flowing south through the White River Valley more or less continuously for about . Along the way it receives water from various springs on the slopes of the

Grant Range The Grant Range is a mountain chain in east-central Nevada in the western United States. It runs for approximately 30 miles (50 km) in a generally north-south direction in northeastern Nye County. It is located south of the Horse Range and ...

to the west and the

Egan Range The Egan Range is a line of mountains in White Pine County, in eastern Nevada in the western United States. From Egan Creek near the historic community of Cherry Creek, the range runs south for approximately 108 miles (173 km), extending so ...

to the east. It provides the water for a string of reservoirs along its course in the Sunnyside area, the largest being Adams-McGill Reservoir. State Route 318 runs mostly parallel to the river. The river channel is dry for some distance, then the water flows again in the

Pahranagat Valley The Pahranagat Valley is a Tonopah Basin landform in Lincoln County, Nevada. The more fertile part of Pahranagat Valley is a narrow ribbon of green (no more than wide) like an oasis in the vast Nevada desert. It is approximately long running nor ...

for about , from the vicinity of

Hiko Hiko may refer to: * Hiko, Nevada * the male or gender neutral version of Hime * Hiko (juggling), juggling in Tongan dance, see Ula (dance) * Mount Hiko , is a mountain on the border between Fukuoka Prefecture and Ōita Prefecture in Kyūsh� ...

and Crystal Springs, passing close by Alamo, feeding Upper Pahranagat Lake and the marshes between it and the lower lake (which collectively form the

Pahranagat National Wildlife Refuge The Pahranagat National Wildlife Refuge is a protected wildlife refuge, at the southern end of the Pahranagat Valley and administered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. It is north of Las Vegas, Nevada, Las Vegas, Nevada, in Lincoln County, ...

). The channel continues into Coyote Springs Valley (location of the planned community Coyote Springs), becoming the Pahranagat Wash, which in turn connects to the Muddy River and thence to

Lake Mead Lake Mead is a reservoir formed by the Hoover Dam on the Colorado River in the Southwestern United States. It is located in the states of Nevada and Arizona, east of Las Vegas. It is the largest reservoir in the US in terms of water capacity. L ...

. Many of the springs supplying the river are now used for irrigation, and a number of the springs have temperatures over .

Fish

The White River system features several

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...

fish species: * White River Colorado gila ''Gila robusta jordani'' * White River speckled dace ''Rhinichthys osculus velifer'' *

White River spinedace The White River spinedace (''Lepidomeda albivallis'') is a critically endangered cyprinid fish of Nevada, occurring only in the White River in the southeastern part of the state. This spindace ranges from green to olive above, a brassy silver o ...

''Lepidomeda albivallis''. Less than 50 of this endangered fish remained in 1993. * Pahranagat spinedace ''Lepidomeda altivelis'' * White River springfish ''Crenichthys baileyi'' Also named for the area is the White River mountainsucker (''Pantosteus intermedius'') subspecies.

References

External links

Web-book: ''White River Valley, Nevada -- Then and Now 1898 to 1980''
{{authority control Rivers of Nevada Tributaries of the Colorado River Rivers of Clark County, Nevada Rivers of White Pine County, Nevada Rivers of Nye County, Nevada Rivers of Lincoln County, Nevada

Course

Fish

See also

References

External links