The Orinoco Delta is a vast

river delta A river delta is a landform shaped like a triangle, created by deposition of sediment that is carried by a river and enters slower-moving or stagnant water. This occurs where a river enters an ocean, sea, estuary, lake, reservoir, or (more rare ...

of the

Orinoco River The Orinoco () is one of the longest rivers in South America at . Its drainage basin, sometimes known as the Orinoquia, covers , with 76.3 percent of it in Venezuela and the remainder in Colombia. It is the fourth largest river in the wor ...

, located in eastern

Venezuela Venezuela (; ), officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela ( es, link=no, República Bolivariana de Venezuela), is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many islands and islets in th ...

Location

The Orinoco Delta is one of the eight

natural regions of Venezuela Because of its natural structure, Venezuela can be divided into eight very distinct natural regions. In the evaluation of a natural region, the human element is not present. The natural region groups of Venezuela formed as a consequence of the a ...

. It covers the whole of

Delta Amacuro State Delta Amacuro State ( es, Estado Delta Amacuro, ) is one of the 23 states of Venezuela, and is the location of the Orinoco Delta. The Paria Gulf and the Atlantic Ocean are found to the north, Bolívar State is found to the south, the Atlantic ...

and a few square kilometers of Monagas State and

Sucre State The Sucre State ( es, Estado Sucre, ) is one of the 23 states of Venezuela. The state capital is Cumaná city. Sucre State covers a total surface area of and, as of the 2011 census, had a population of 896,921. The most important river in ...

, comprising all the mouths of the

Orinoco The Orinoco () is one of the longest rivers in South America at . Its drainage basin, sometimes known as the Orinoquia, covers , with 76.3 percent of it in Venezuela and the remainder in Colombia. It is the fourth largest river in the wor ...

. It is divided into two sections: the principal, at the northernmost part of the system, located between Caño Manamo and the left shore of

Caño Araguao Caño is a barrio in the municipality of Guánica, Puerto Rico. Its population in 2010 was 1,788. See also * List of communities in Puerto Rico In Puerto Rico, there are 78 municipalities and 902 municipio subdivisions made up of 827 barrio ...

, where the majority of villages are established, including the state capital Tucupita; and the secondary, between the right shore of Caño Araguao and

Río Grande The Rio Grande ( and ), known in Mexico as the Río Bravo del Norte or simply the Río Bravo, is one of the principal rivers (along with the Colorado River) in the southwestern United States and in northern Mexico. The length of the Rio G ...

. The Warao people live in the region.

Hydrology

The delta is fan-shaped, formed by the Orinoco River as it splits into numerous distributaries, called ''caños'', which meander through the delta on their way to the sea. The main distributary is called the Rio Grande, which empties south-southeast through the southern portion of the delta, and the second major distributary is Caño Manamo, which runs northward along the western edge of the delta. The area of this region is approximately . The Orinoco Delta is characterized by being non-centric,

lagoon A lagoon is a shallow body of water separated from a larger body of water by a narrow landform, such as reefs, barrier islands, barrier peninsulas, or isthmuses. Lagoons are commonly divided into '' coastal lagoons'' (or ''barrier lagoons ...

lacking, and

ocean The ocean (also the sea or the world ocean) is the body of salt water that covers approximately 70.8% of the surface of Earth and contains 97% of Earth's water. An ocean can also refer to any of the large bodies of water into which the wor ...

ic, somewhat similar to the delta of the

Niger River The Niger River ( ; ) is the main river of West Africa, extending about . Its drainage basin is in area. Its source is in the Guinea Highlands in south-eastern Guinea near the Sierra Leone border. It runs in a crescent shape through Mal ...

. Daily tides bring sea water up the "caños", causing the "macareo" or

pororoca The Pororoca (, ) is a tidal bore, with waves up to high that travel as much as inland upstream on the Amazon River and adjacent rivers. Its name might come from the indigenous Tupi language, where it could translate into "great roar". It could b ...

and reversing the flow direction of water, at least on surface.

Environment

The predominant vegetation is in the Orinoco Delta swamp forests ecoregion. Along the coast and the river margins there are stretches of Amazon-Orinoco-Southern Caribbean mangroves, specifically the Guianan mangroves ecoregion. To the west, and closer to the coast, there are patches of the Orinoco wetlands ecoregion. The delta includes large areas of permanent

wetland A wetland is a distinct ecosystem that is flooded or saturated by water, either permanently (for years or decades) or seasonally (for weeks or months). Flooding results in oxygen-free (Anoxic waters, anoxic) processes prevailing, especially in t ...

s as well as seasonally-flooded freshwater swamp forests. The river margins of the delta are fringed with

mangrove A mangrove is a shrub or tree that grows in coastal saline or brackish water. The term is also used for tropical coastal vegetation consisting of such species. Mangroves are taxonomically diverse, as a result of convergent evolution in severa ...

References

Sources

* * * *

External links

Venezuela Tourism Directory

Geo-Environmental Characterization of the Delta del Orinoco (University of Texas)
* * * River deltas Delta Delta Biosphere reserves of Venezuela Orinoco basin Wetlands of Venezuela Geography of Delta Amacuro Geography of Monagas Geography of Sucre (state) Landforms of South America {{Venezuela-geo-stub