Platte River is a major river in the State of Nebraska.
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The Platte River is a tributary of the Missouri River, which itself is a tributary of the Mississippi River which flows to the Gulf of Mexico.
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The Platte over most of its length is a broad, shallow, meandering stream with a sandy bottom and many islands—a braided stream.
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Platte River is one of the most significant tributary systems in the watershed of the Missouri, draining a large portion of the central Great Plains in Nebraska and the eastern Rocky Mountains in Colorado and Wyoming.
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The first Europeans to see the Platte River were French explorers and fur trappers about 1714; they first called it the Nebraskier, a transliteration of the name given by the Otoe people, meaning "flat water".
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The head of the North Platte River is essentially all of Jackson County; its boundaries are the continental divide on the west and south and the mountain drainage peaks on the east—the north boundary is the state of Wyoming.
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Shortly after passing Casper, the North Platte River turns to the east-southeast and flows about 350 miles to the city of North Platte River, Nebraska.
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In western Nebraska, the banks and riverbed of the North Platte provide a green oasis amid an otherwise semi-arid region of North America.
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Today, by the time the North Platte River reaches Paxton, Nebraska it is much smaller due to the extensive water taken from it for irrigation.
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The part of the river labeled the South Platte is formed in Park County, Colorado, located southwest of Denver, in the South Park grassland basin and mountains east of the continental divide.
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South Platte River has been dammed about 20 times for water storage, drinking water and irrigation purposes in Colorado as it flows to its confluence with the North Platte River.
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The South Platte River serves as the principal source of water for arid eastern Colorado.
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The Platte River is joined from the north by the about 70-mile-long Loup River about 5 miles southeast of Columbus.
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Near Fremont the Platte River turns sharply and flows south-southeast about 10 miles to about Waterloo, Nebraska—located about 20 miles west of Omaha.
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Near Waterloo the Platte River turns even more and heads almost due south for about 10 miles.
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In western Nebraska, the banks and riverbed of the Platte provide a green oasis amid an otherwise semi-arid region of North America.
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The central Platte River valley is an important stopover for migratory water birds, such as the whooping crane and sandhill crane, in their yearly traversal of the Central Flyway.
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Fossil evidence in the Platte River valley indicates this crane stopover has been active for over 10 million years.
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The first-known European to see the Platte River was the French explorer Etienne de Veniard, sieur de Bourgmont in 1714, who named it the Nebraskier, after its Oto name, meaning "flat water".
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Platte River later guided the 1720 Villasur expedition to the area in a Spanish effort to stop French expansion onto the Great Plains.
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Platte River was returning to the Missouri River posts from the newly established Fort Astoria on the Columbia River near the Pacific Ocean.
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The route along the Platte River included all these emigration trails and was developed as an important trail route used by migrant wagon trains for westward United States expansion after 1841.
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The Platte River valley provided an easily passable wagon corridor; it sloped gradually up in height as it went almost due west from the Missouri.
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The Platte River route had access to water, grass, buffalo and buffalo 'chips, ' which the Indians and emigrants used as fuel for fires.
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The Platte River's water was silty and bad tasting, but it was usable if no other water was available.
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The trail through the Platte River Valley extended about 450 miles in the present state of Nebraska.
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Platte River is in the middle of the Central Flyway, a primary north–south corridor for migratory birds from their summer nesting grounds in the north, south for the winter, and the return in the spring.
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Common plants in the Platte River area are big and little bluestem, switch grass, and cottonwood trees.
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The Platte River area has long supported many animals but recently, due to urbanization and farming causing loss of habitat, the numbers have declined.
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Platte River flowing through an arid part of the mid-west has been widely overused.
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The claims on the Platte River water have exceeded the supply of water in drier years.
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