Week 3 - Rivers - The Colorado River

The Colorado river is one of the major rivers in North America and part of Mexico.  It extends for about 1450 miles and it encompasses parts of seven U.S states and parts of two states in Mexico.  The valley of the Colorado river is composed of layers of limestone, sandstone, shale, granite, and schist. Most of the basin of the river is arid where it crosses the Sonoran and Mojave deserts, and also some forest areas are found when the river runs through the Colorado Plateau and the Rocky Mountains. The rocks on the side of the river look like they were worn away by water erosion over a long period of time.  At an average, the river carries about 23,000 cubic feet per second of water.  The river begins in the Southern Rocky mountains in Colorado and the mouth of the river is located at the Gulf of California.  About 90 percent of the total flow of the water in the river originates upstream in Northern Arizona as a result of natural runoff from precipitation and melting snow in the Mountains of Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, and New Mexico.  There are fifteen dams on the main stem of the Colorado river, one of them being the famous Hoover dam, which is used to produce electricity using the flow of the river to power turbines.  Flooding risks are high in the Colorado river when there is increased snowfall in the mountains.  The threat of flooding is reduced by building dams to release the water flow in a controlled manner by means of spillways.  The Colorado river is used as a means of irrigation and domestic uses.  The river is an important supply of water to areas that do not receive large amounts of rain and is an important part of the economic prosperity of many agricultural areas.