Artibonite River

The River Artibonite (; ) is a river in the island of Hispaniola. It is 321 km long (68 km in the Dominican Republic, 253 km in Haiti), the longest of the island and of Haiti.

Name
The Taíno name of the river was Hatibonico. Peter Martyr d'Anghiera wrote that the name was Attiboni or Attibonicus. Some people said that the name was Guayajayuco but it is another river, tributary of the Artibonite.

Course
The source of the Artibonite is to the northeast of Río Limpio, in the Cordillera Central, Dominican Republic. The mouth of the Artibonite is in Haiti, south of La Grand Saline, at about . It flows into the Gulf of Gonâve.

The river is the border between the Dominican Republic and Haiti for several kilometres, from the town of Pedro Santana to the point where it is joined by the River Macasías, and then turns west into Haiti.

Its watershed has an area of 9,013 km2 (2,614 km2 in the Dominican Republic, the rest in Haiti). Its discharge (volume of water which passes through a section of the river per unit of time) is 16.6 cubic metres per second at Pedro Santana.

Tributaries
The most important tributaries are the rivers Libón, Macasías and Joca, all of them in the Dominican Republic. The Libón River is the only important tributary that flows into the right side of the Artibonite.

Environment
Deforestation has affected in a bad way the quality and amount of water in the River Artibonite in the Dominican Republic and Haiti. There are not many fishes; only tilapias are caught. There were American crocodiles (Crocodylus acutus) in the River Artibonite and in other rivers of the Hispaniola, but now they are found only in the big lakes of the island.

Uses
The water of the river is used for irrigation in Haiti but not in the Dominican Republic because it flows here through high mountains. The Peligre Hydroelectric Dam was built on the Arbitonite; it produces electricity for Haiti.

References

Category:Rivers of the Dominican Republic
Category:Geography of Haiti