Sefīd-Rūd


The Sefīd-Rūd is a river approximately long, rising in the Alborz mountain range of northwestern Iran and flowing generally northeast to enter the Caspian Sea at Rasht. The river is Iran's second longest river after the Karun.

Names

Other names and transcriptions include Sepīd-Rūd, Sefidrud, Sefidrood, Sepidrood, and Sepidrud. Above Manjil, "Long Red River".
The river is identified with the Amardus or Mardus river of antiquity. It was called Kizil Ozien by the Turks and Azeris.
The river is historically famous for the quantity of its fish, especially the Caspian trout, Salmo trutta caspius.

Geography

The Sefid-Rud has cut a water gap through the Alborz mountain range, the Manjil gap, capturing its two headwater tributaries, the Qizil Üzan and Shahrood rivers. It then widens the valley between the Talesh Hills and the main Alborz range. The gap provides a major route between Tehran and Gīlān Province with its Caspian lowlands.
In the wide valley before the Sefid-Rud enters the Caspian Sea a number of transportation and irrigation canals have been cut; the two biggest are the Khomam and the Now.

Dam and reservoir

The Sefid-Rud was dammed in 1962 by the Shahbanu Farah Dam, which created a reservoir and allowed the irrigation of an additional. The reservoir mediates some flooding and significantly increased rice production in the Sefid Rud Delta. The hydroelectric component of the dam generates 87,000 kilowatts. The completion of the dam had a negative impact on the river's fisheries, through reduced stream flow, increased water temperature, and decreased food availability, especially for sturgeon but also for the Caspian trout.

History

The river was known in antiquity by the names Mardos and Amardos. In the Hellenistic period the north side of the Sefid was occupied by the mountain tribe the Cadusii.
David Rohl identifies the Sefīd-Rūd with the Biblical Pishon river.

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