Pilchuck River

Tributary of the Snohomish River, northwest Washington, United States

47°59′19″N 121°40′43″W / 47.98861°N 121.67861°W / 47.98861; -121.67861^[1] • elevation2,125 ft (648 m)^[2] MouthSnohomish River

• coordinates

47°54′13″N 122°5′27″W / 47.90361°N 122.09083°W / 47.90361; -122.09083^[1]

• elevation

8 ft (2.4 m)^[2]Length40 mi (64 km)^[2]Basin size127 sq mi (330 km²)^[3]Discharge • average467 cu ft/s (13.2 m³/s) • minimum36 cu ft/s (1.0 m³/s) • maximum5,050 cu ft/s (143 m³/s)

The Pilchuck River (Lushootseed: dxʷkʷiƛ̕əb)^[4] is a river in Snohomish County in the U.S. state of Washington. It is a tributary of the Snohomish River. The name is derived from the Chinook Jargon pilpil ("blood", "red") and chuck ("water"), or "red water".^[5] The Lushootseed name means "flowing red," kʷiƛ̕ being an archaic term for "red" in Northern Lushootseed.^[6]

Course

The Pilchuck River originates in the Cascade Range. It flows generally west until it reaches Granite Falls, then it turns and flows south, passing by Lochsloy and Machias before emptying into the Snohomish River near Snohomish. The Snohomish River empties into Possession Sound, part of Puget Sound.^[3]

The Pilchuck River flows alongside the Centennial Trail from roughly Machias to Snohomish.

References

^ ^a ^b U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Pilchuck River
^ ^a ^b ^c Calculated via Google Earth
^ ^a ^b Washington Water Year 2005, USGS Water Resources Data
^ Bates, Dawn; Hess, Thom; Hilbert, Vi (1994). Lushootseed Dictionary. Seattle: University of Washington Press. p. 126. ISBN 978-0-295-97323-4. OCLC 29877333.
^ Bright, William (2004). Native American placenames of the United States. University of Oklahoma Press. p. 382. ISBN 978-0-8061-3598-4. Retrieved 6 April 2011.
^ Hess, Thom (1979). "Central Coast Salish Words for Deer: Their Wavelike Distribution". International Journal of American Linguistics. 45 (1): 5–16 – via JSTOR.