The Lemhi River is a
[U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline data]
The National Map
, accessed May 3, 2011 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
Idaho
Idaho ( ) is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. To the north, it shares a small portion of the Canada–United States border with the province of British Columbia. It borders the states of Montana and Wyom ...
in the United States. It is a
tributary
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 ...
of the
Salmon River, which in turn is tributary to the
Snake River
The Snake River is a major river of the greater Pacific Northwest region in the United States. At long, it is the largest tributary of the Columbia River, in turn, the largest North American river that empties into the Pacific Ocean. The Snake ...
and
Columbia River
The Columbia River (Upper Chinook: ' or '; Sahaptin: ''Nch’i-Wàna'' or ''Nchi wana''; Sinixt dialect'' '') is the largest river in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. The river rises in the Rocky Mountains of British Columbia, C ...
.
Course
From its source near
Leadore and the confluence of several headwater streams, the Lemhi River flows generally northwest, through the Lemhi Valley, between the
Lemhi Range
The Lemhi Range is a mountain range in the U.S. state of Idaho, spanning the eastern part of the state between the Lost River Range and the Beaverhead Mountains. The highest point in the range is Diamond Peak at , the fourth highest peak in Ida ...
to the west, and the
Bitterroot Range
The Bitterroot Range is a mountain range and a subrange of the Rocky Mountains that runs along the border of Montana and Idaho in the northwestern United States. The range spans an area of and is named after the bitterroot (''Lewisia rediviva' ...
and Beaverhead Mountains to the east. The Lemhi River flows into the
Salmon River at the city of
Salmon
Salmon () is the common name for several list of commercially important fish species, commercially important species of euryhaline ray-finned fish from the family (biology), family Salmonidae, which are native to tributary, tributaries of the ...
.
River modification
The water of the Lemhi River and its tributaries is used for irrigation agriculture. Of the river's mainstem tributaries, only 7% are not totally disconnected year round due to diversion for irrigation.
History
In August 1805
Lewis and Clark
Lewis may refer to:
Names
* Lewis (given name), including a list of people with the given name
* Lewis (surname), including a list of people with the surname
Music
* Lewis (musician), Canadian singer
* "Lewis (Mistreated)", a song by Radiohead ...
crossed the continental divide at the
Lemhi Pass
Lemhi Pass is a high mountain pass in the Beaverhead Mountains, part of the Bitterroot Range in the Rocky Mountains and within Salmon-Challis National Forest. The pass lies on the Montana-Idaho border on the continental divide, at an elevation ...
to the east of the Lemhi River. There, the group encountered a tribe of
Shoshone
The Shoshone or Shoshoni ( or ) are a Native American tribe with four large cultural/linguistic divisions:
* Eastern Shoshone: Wyoming
* Northern Shoshone: southern Idaho
* Western Shoshone: Nevada, northern Utah
* Goshute: western Utah, easter ...
Indians, one of whom turned out to be
Cameahwait Cameahwait was the brother of Sacagawea, and a Shoshone chief. He was the head of the first group of inhabitants of modern-day Idaho who were encountered by Europeans.
Cameahwait met Meriwether Lewis and three other members of the Lewis and Cla ...
, brother of
Sacagawea
Sacagawea ( or ; also spelled Sakakawea or Sacajawea; May – December 20, 1812 or April 9, 1884)[Sacagawea]
...
. The expedition sent a reconnaissance party, guided by Swooping Eagle,
[http://lewisandclarkjournals.unl.edu/read/?_xmlsrc=1805-08-20.xml&_xslsrc=LCstyles.xsl. ] north along the Lemhi to the Salmon River attempting to find a navigable path, but turned back when they found that the Salmon was not passable by boat or on land.
[Cameahwait's Village]
retrieved on March 11, 2008.
See also
*
Lemhi (disambiguation)
*
List of rivers in Idaho
*
List of longest streams of Idaho
A total of seventy streams that are at least long flow through the U.S. state of Idaho. All of these streams originate in the United States except the Kootenai River (third-longest) and the Moyie River (thirty-first-longest), both of which beg ...
References
External links
{{authority control
Rivers of Idaho
Rivers of Lemhi County, Idaho
Tributaries of the Salmon River (Idaho)