Talk:Pend Oreille River

Spelling in Canada

In its passage through British Columbia its name is spelled according to the proper French form of the name: the Pend d'Oreille River. --huh, I'd never heard that before.. I don't disbelieve, but would appreciate a reference. The external link provided didn't say anything about that. Thanks! Pfly 06:12, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Well it's been a while. I don't know French, but my understanding is that "Pend d'Oreille" is not exactly "proper French". Babelfish translates it as "ear hangs". Since this page doesn't even say what it is supposed to mean in French, I'm going to edit this bit. I'll add some other stuff to make up for it. Pfly 07:25, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

Drainage basin

I've been trying to find the size of the river's full drainage basin with all tributaries. This would be mostly in the US, except the final bit in Canada as well as the far upstream tributary of the North Fork Flathead River. My searches have resulted in several different numbers from seemingly reliable sources. I'm unable to determine right now which one is best, so I'm posting them all here (value: source (comment)). Also note the units (sq mi and sq km) are given in the order first of the actual value cited. Listed by size given:

• 24,200 square miles (62,678 km²): Pend Oreille River Drainage (I'm nearly positive this does not include the Canadian portions)

• 24,200 square miles (62,678 km²): The Rivers, Balance of Power: Hydroelectric Development in Southeastern British Columbia (Although size in km2 is given first (as 62,678 km2), the parenthetical size of 24,000 sq mi is identical to the value given by the first source here (Pend Oreille River Drainage), which does not seem to take Canada into account. The rounded sq mi figure of 24,000 compared to the precise sq km figure suggests they took the imnh.isu.edu figure and converted it)

• 66,800 square kilometres (25,792 sq mi): Seven Mile Project Water use Plan, BC Hydro (Clearly takes the lower Canadian portion into account and is the only source listed here that actually mentions the Flathead River. Gives the Canadian portion as "less than 5,000 square kilometres (1,931 sq mi). I think this may be the one to use)

• 66,900 square kilometres (25,830 sq mi): Water Quality Assessment of Pend d'Oreille River at Waneta, Ministry of Environment, Canada (Not clear about the BC Flathead River portion, and oddly slightly different from the previous value given by BC Hydro. Gives breakdown by country as US: 65,300 square kilometres (25,212 sq mi), Canada: 1,600 square kilometres (618 sq mi). BC Hydro gives a much larger figure for the Canadian portion, suggesting it does take the Flathead River into account, yet its total basin size is smaller!)

• "about" 26,000 square miles (67,340 km²): Focus on Pend Oreille Watershed, Washington State Department of Ecology (Appears to take into account at least the final Canadian portion, but unclear whether the Flathead River portion is included. Also "about 26,000" is lacking in precision, suggesting it was rounded to thousands of sq miles)

Having typed all that up, I got a better sense of it and am going to go with the BC Hydro figure. Let this talk page serve as why that source was chosen. Pfly (talk) 03:26, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Conservation section

The Pend Oreille Basin Commission site domain appears to have been taken over by a real estate agent and no longer represents the commission.