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19-460: The Sarthe ( French pronunciation: [saʁt] ) is a 313.9-kilometre-long (195.0 mi) river in western France. Together with the river Mayenne it forms the river Maine , which is a tributary to the river Loire . Its source is in the Orne department , near Moulins-la-Marche . It flows generally southwest, through the following departments and towns: Its main tributaries are

38-434: A navigational context, if one were floating on a raft or other vessel in the main stream, this would be the side the tributary enters from as one floats past; alternately, if one were floating down the tributary, the main stream meets it on the opposite bank of the tributary. This information may be used to avoid turbulent water by moving towards the opposite bank before approaching the confluence. An early tributary

57-447: A larger stream ( 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 into which they flow, drain the surrounding drainage basin of its surface water and groundwater , leading the water out into an ocean. The Irtysh is a chief tributary of the Ob river and is also the longest tributary river in

76-414: A left tributary which is called Right Fork Steer Creek. These naming conventions are reflective of the circumstances of a particular river's identification and charting: people living along the banks of a river, with a name known to them, may then float down the river in exploration, and each tributary joining it as they pass by appears as a new river, to be given its own name, perhaps one already known to

95-410: A third stream entering between two others is designated the middle fork; or the streams are distinguished by the relative height of one to the other, as one stream descending over a cataract into another becomes the upper fork, and the one it descends into, the lower ; or by relative volume: the smaller stream designated the little fork, the larger either retaining its name unmodified, or receives

114-514: Is a tributary that joins the main stem river closer to its source than its mouth, that is, before the river's midpoint ; a late tributary joins the main stem further downstream, closer to its mouth than to its source, that is, after the midpoint. In the United States, where tributaries sometimes have the same name as the river into which they feed, they are called forks . These are typically designated by compass direction. For example,

133-620: Is in the foothills of Mont des Avaloirs at an altitude of 961 feet (293m); from there the river runs from east to west until it reaches Sept-Forges , at which point it turns to the south. After being joined by the Oudon , the Mayenne forms a confluence with the Sarthe north of Angers . The confluence of these two rivers is called the Maine , which is the local pronunciation of Mayenne. The waters of

152-648: The American River in California receives flow from its North, Middle, and South forks. The Chicago River 's North Branch has the East, West, and Middle Fork; the South Branch has its South Fork, and used to have a West Fork as well (now filled in). Forks are sometimes designated as right or left. Here, the handedness is from the point of view of an observer facing upstream. For instance, Steer Creek has

171-657: The Loir and the Huisne from the left, and the Vaige , the Erve and the Vègre from the right. The Sarthe has 20 weirs and locks. The channel is well marked and navigation is straightforward, except for the risk of shoals in certain sections. Mayenne (river) Its source is in the department of Orne near the commune of Lalacelle , between Pré-en-Pail and Alençon . The source

190-433: The 17th and 18th centuries justified engineering with locks and weirs not only to Laval but also upstream to Mayenne. This extension, with 20 locks and weirs, was built at the same time as about 40 flash locks were replaced by 25 weirs and locks, some in short lock-cuts, between 1853 et 1878. The river was used by barges carrying up to 130 tonnes, and the principal traffics were construction materials (wood and stone), coal from

209-569: The Maine then empty into the Loire south of Angers. Departments and towns along the river include: It is featured prominently in the video game Call of Duty 3 . The Mayenne was navigable in its natural state up to Château-Gontier. Works were undertaken in the 16th century to make the river navigable upstream from here to Laval; royal decrees by François I in 1536 and 1537 authorised the necessary works, including flash locks . Economic expansion in

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228-545: The Mayenne has been observed for a period of 44 years (1965–2008) at Chambellay, situated upstream of the confluence with the Sarthe, and just upstream from where the Oudon joins the Mayenne. At this location, the drainage basin of the river is 4,160 km (1,610 sq mi) out of a total of 5,820 km (2,250 sq mi), which is less than three-quarters of the entire drainage basin (71.5%), and also does not include

247-416: The designation big . Tributaries are sometimes listed starting with those nearest to the source of the river and ending with those nearest to the mouth of the river . The Strahler stream order examines the arrangement of tributaries in a hierarchy of first, second, third and higher orders, with the first-order tributary being typically the least in size. For example, a second-order tributary would be

266-531: The flow of the Mayenne is irregular because of the impermeability of the sandstone , granite , and schist which form its drainage basin . Thus, for an average flow of 39 m /s (1,400 cu ft/s) before the Mayenne's confluence with the Oudon , the yearly minimum flow can range from very low (4 m /s (140 cu ft/s) at Laval) to very high (flash floods with flows of 200 m /s (7,100 cu ft/s) at Laval and more than 800 m /s (28,000 cu ft/s) at Chambellay). The flow of

285-426: The flow of the Oudon, the Mayenne's principal tributary. The average yearly flow at Chambellay is 39.3 m /s (1,390 cu ft/s), which corresponds to over 50 m /s (1,800 cu ft/s) if the rest of the drainage basin were included. The main tributaries of the Mayenne are, from source to mouth: Tributary A tributary , or an affluent , is a stream or river that flows into

304-403: The main stream. Distributaries are most often found in river deltas . Right tributary , or right-bank tributary , and left tributary , or left-bank tributary , describe the orientation of the tributary relative to the flow of the main stem river. These terms are defined from the perspective of looking downstream, that is, facing the direction the water current of the main stem is going. In

323-441: The mines of L'Huisserie , grain, fruit and vegetables. At this time it was planned to build a watershed canal north from Mayenne to the tidal river Orne at Caen, but the project was abandoned as railways became the preferred carrier of freight. The navigation was abandoned after World War II, but restored from the 1970s as a cruising waterway. The upstream section was completed in the early 1990s. In spite of abundant precipitation,

342-464: The people who live upon its banks. Conversely, explorers approaching a new land from the sea encounter its rivers at their mouths, where they name them on their charts, then, following a river upstream, encounter each tributary as a forking of the stream to the right and to the left, which then appear on their charts as such; or the streams are seen to diverge by the cardinal direction (north, south, east, or west) in which they proceed upstream, sometimes

361-433: The world with a length of 4,248 km (2,640 mi). The Madeira River is the largest tributary river by volume in the world with an average discharge of 31,200 m /s (1.1 million cu ft/s). A confluence , where two or more bodies of water meet, usually refers to the joining of tributaries. The opposite to a tributary is a distributary , a river or stream that branches off from and flows away from

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