Boyle River
Boyle River at Knockvicar.
Native nameAn Bhúill (Irish)
Physical characteristics
Source 
 • locationLough Gara
MouthRiver Shannon
 • location
Lough Eidin

The Boyle River is a river in Ireland. Forming part of the Shannon River Basin, it flows from Lough Gara on the Sligo/Roscommon county border and thence through the town of Boyle to Lough Key. From there is continues eastwards through the village of Knockvicar to the River Shannon at Lough Drumharlow, near Carrick-on-Shannon. The length of the Boyle River (from its source in County Mayo to the Shannon) is 64.4 km (40mi).[1] The area of its basin is 725 km2.[2]

Urlaur Abbey on L. Urlaur Co. Mayo

Boyle River Basin

The Upper Shannon catchment, above Carrick-on-Shannon (area: 1,301 km2[3]), has two distinct reaches, the River Shannon (basin area: 576 km2), which rises in County Cavan, and the Boyle River (basin area: 725 km2), with its source in County Mayo, which have their confluence at Lough Eidin/Drumharlow, approximately 4.7 km upstream of Carrick-On-Shannon.

The Boyle River has its origins in the rivers Lung and Breedoge, which flow into Lough Gara. The 29 km (18 mi) Lung River[4] is fed by Urlaur Lough and Errit Lough on the Mayo/Roscommon border.[5][6]

The river flow from the furthest reaches of the Boyle catchment to Limerick city has a measurement of 290 km (180ml).[7] When added to the Shannon's 102.1 km (63.5ml) estuary, this gives a total river length of 392.1 km (243.5ml), which makes it the longest river within the Shannon River Basin (from source to mouth), 31.6 km (19.5ml) longer than the Shannon Pot source.[8]

Lung River at Crunnaun Bridge near Ballaghaderreen Co. Roscommon

See also

References

Wikimedia Commons has media related to River Boyle.
  1. ^ "Notes on river basins". 8 June 1872 – via Internet Archive.
  2. ^ Dublin Marine Institute 1998: Studies of Irish Rivers and Lakes: Moriarty, Christopher - Table 10.1.
  3. ^ "Leitrim County Council Table 16.8" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 6 October 2014. Retrieved 30 September 2014.
  4. ^ "Ballaghaderreen Co. Roscommonn". www.mayo-ireland.ie.
  5. ^ "Urlaur Lough" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 11 September 2014. Retrieved 9 September 2014.
  6. ^ "Errit Lough" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 10 September 2014.
  7. ^ "River Habitat Survey, Fig. 2". Archived from the original on 13 September 2014. Retrieved 11 September 2014.
  8. ^ "European Commission Rivers Map" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 19 August 2015. Retrieved 11 September 2014.

53°57′30″N 08°24′21″W / 53.95833°N 8.40583°W / 53.95833; -8.40583

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