Quiz question - River<River<River<River<River<River ??

[Graham Shaw]

Feel free to move this to the social board of course Admin, but I thought it would get more views here and as I am involved in setting interesting quizzes, I am keen to pick the geographical brains of anglers from all over the country. Anyway here's my unusual question, and it does relate to barbel rivers:

Looking at some maps the other day, I found what I think is the only example in the UK of a River - not a beck, brook, burn, ghyll, dike or stream but something that on the map is a RIVER - which is a tributary of another river, which which is a tributary of another river, which is a tributary of another river, which is a tributary of another river, which is a tributary of another river which flows into the sea. Not including the estuary as a separate river, i.e. only rivers which are at least partly non-tidal count (Solent, Wash, Humber, Milford Haven etc etc do not count)

So six rivers. In at least three of which you can catch barbel. Name them!

And if anyone can find another example anywhere in the UK, I'd be very grateful - though I'm not sure there are any! I will of course take the Welsh and Scots equivalents "Afon" and "Water of ....." in place of "River"

 

[Joe Winstanley]

This had me stumped, had a couple of ideas but ran out at 5...had to google in the end because it was pi55ing me off!

Won't spoil it by posting the answers, the name of one of the rivers could act as a real red herring...

Thanks Graham

 

[Graham Shaw]

Well done - I'm surprised you could google it at all, rather than just looking at the maps online, which is what I had to do. The purpose of the exercise is mainly to check out my question, to see if anyone can point out another '6 river combination.' So feel free to post the answer tomorrow morning if nobody's got it!

 

[Chris Jones]

I'm intrigued enough to be following the thread to see the answer. I've no idea what the answer is, but as most of the bigger tributaries of the Northern rivers I'm really familiar with are becks, gills, and stells. I suspect it'll be something down South where many watercourses smaller than some becks up here are classed as rivers. For example, the Swale only has one river tributary, the Wiske. However, it has at least two beck tributaries, Cod Beck, Bedale Beck (and perhaps Skeeby Beck) that are of comparable size to the river Wiske. I'd guess that it's likely to be the Thames, and something like the Kennet, Lodden or Colne as the next level up. All have numerous small river tributaries, but which has quite enough is another matter. However, I'd also wonder as to whether the likes of the Severn or Warwickshire Avon might be candidates. There seem to be plenty of little rivers around the West Midlands.

 

[Mark Swaby]

Interesting little quiz

 

[Graham Shaw]

So well done to Joe Winstanley who sent me his answer by P-M and reckoned that this link is good enough to confirm that the only actual "river" in England that is a fifth-level tributary is, as I thought, the tiny River RIBBLE (no not that Ribble), which meeets the River Holme near the excellent 'Nook' pub in Holmfirth, which flows into the Colne in Huddersfield, after which we can find barbel in the River Calder, which flows into Aire and then the Yorkshire Ouse.

List of rivers of England - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

I haven't found any equivalent in Wales or Scotland. So it looks as if I can go ahead and set my question as planned.