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This earth cache will take you to one of the
many river parks on the Mighty Mississippi. Here you can
learn so much about the history and geology of the river. The
topics mainly discussed here are erosion features and topsoil
sedementaion.
Mississippi River
History
The Mississippi River, derived
from the old Ojibwe word misi-ziibi meaning 'great river'
(gichi-ziibi 'big river' at its headwaters), is the second-longest
named river in North America, with a length of 2320 miles (3733 km)
from Lake Itasca to the Gulf of Mexico.
The longest of the many long Mississippi tributaries is the
Missouri River with the Arkansas River as second longest. Measured
by water volume, the largest of all Mississippi tributaries is the
Ohio River.
From its source at Lake Itasca, 1,475 feet (450 m) above sea level
in Itasca State Park located in Clearwater County, Minnesota, the
river falls to 801 feet prior to St. Anthony Falls in Minneapolis.
There it drops to 725 feet (220 m), creating the only waterfall
along the river's course. The Mississippi is joined by the
Minnesota River in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the Wisconsin River in
Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, the Illinois River and the Missouri
River near St. Louis, Missouri, and by the Ohio River at Cairo,
Illinois. The Arkansas River joins the Mississippi in the state of
Arkansas. The Atchafalaya River in Louisiana is a major
distributary of the Mississippi.
The Mississippi drains most of the area between the Rocky
Mountains and the Appalachian Mountains, except for the areas
drained by Hudson Bay via the Red River of the North, the Great
Lakes and the Rio Grande. It runs through two states — Minnesota
and Louisiana — and was used to define the borders of eight states
(the river has since shifted, but the state borders have not) —
Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky, Arkansas, Tennessee,
and Mississippi — before emptying into the Gulf of Mexico about 100
miles (160 km) downstream from New Orleans.
Measurements of the length of the Mississippi from Lake Itasca to
the Gulf of Mexico vary, but the EPA's number is 2,320 miles (3,733
km). The retention time from Lake Itasca to the Gulf is about 90
days.[3]
The river is divided into the upper Mississippi, from its source
south to the Ohio River, and the lower Mississippi, from the Ohio
to its mouth near New Orleans. The upper Mississippi is further
divided into three sections: the headwaters, from the source to
Saint Anthony Falls; a series of man-made lakes between Minneapolis
and St. Louis, Missouri; and the middle Mississippi, a relatively
free-flowing river downstream of the confluence with the Missouri
River at St. Louis.
A series of 29 locks and dams on the upper Mississippi, most of
which were built in the 1930s, is designed primarily to maintain a
9 foot (2.7 m) deep channel for commercial barge traffic.[4][5] The
lakes formed are also used for recreational boating and fishing.
The dams make the river deeper and wider but do not stop it. No
flood control is intended. During periods of high flow, the gates,
some of which are submersible, are completely opened and the dams
simply cease to function. Below St. Louis, the Mississippi is
relatively free-flowing, although it is constrained by numerous
levees and directed by numerous wing dams.
Through a natural process known as delta switching the lower
Mississippi River has shifted its final course to the ocean every
thousand years or so. This occurs because the deposits of silt and
sediment begin to clog its channel, raising the river's level and
causing it to eventually find a steeper, more direct route to the
Gulf of Mexico. The abandoned distributary diminishes in volume and
forms what are known as bayous. This process has, over the past
5,000 years, caused the coastline of south Louisiana to advance
toward the Gulf from 15 to 50 miles (25 to 80 km).
U.S. government scientists determined in the 1950s that the
Mississippi River was starting to switch to the Atchafalaya River
channel because of its much steeper path to the Gulf of Mexico, and
eventually the Atchafalaya River would capture the Mississippi
River and become its main channel to the Gulf of Mexico, which
would leave New Orleans on a side channel. As a result, the U.S.
Congress authorized a project called the Old River Control
Structure, which has prevented the Mississippi River from leaving
its current channel that drains into the Gulf via New Orleans.
Because of the large scale of high energy water flow through the
Old River Control Structure threatening to damage the structure, an
auxiliary flow control station was built adjacent to the standing
control station. This US$300 million project was completed in 1986
by the Army Corps Of Engineers.
Requirements
Question 1 - What is the big blue
item that is located when you are entering the park called, and
what is it used for? (it should have a plaque beside it!)
Question 2 - How wide is the river at the overlook closest to the
museum?
Question 3 - What does the plaque say when you enter the overlook
closest to the museum?
NEW due to new posting requirements you
must now post a picture from the area. Go to the overlook closest
to the museum and take your picture in front of the river!
Additional Hints
(No hints available.)