Canindé River (Piauí)

The Canindé River is a seasonal waterway flowing into the Parnaiba River near Amarante in the State of Piauí in northeastern Brazil. The stream flows for approx. 350 km from headwaters in the foothills on the Piaui/Pernambuco border (northwest of Afrânio, Pernambuco) northwest into Piauí then through Paulistana and Oeiras to Amarante on the junction of the Canindé with the Parnaiba. Oeiras is the main commercial center in the Canindé River valley. The biome type along the river is caatinga, which is composed of typical northeastern Brazilian semiarid vegetation. The river and fauna and flora of the environs were described by the German naturalists Johann Baptist von Spix and Carl Friedrich Philipp von Martius during their travels in Brazil in April and May, 1819.[1]

Canindé River
Location
CountryBrazil
Physical characteristics
Source 
 • locationPiaui/Pernambuco border
 • elevation522 m (1,713 ft)
Mouth 
 • location
Parnaiba River
 • elevation
104 m (341 ft)
Length350 km (220 mi)

The Canindé and its tributary the Piauí River[Note 1] which enters it about 125 km below Oeiras, constitute what is often referred to as the Caninde-Piaui river system. The Caninde / Piauí River basin with an area of approximately 75,000 km2, is the largest sub-basin (29.7%) of the Parnaíba River Basin, which constitutes 98.3% of the land area of the State of Piaui.

The Caninde-Piaui river system and its tributaries present a temporary torrential flow regime: flow rate is characterized by abrupt variations due to tropical storms during the January - April rainy season.[2]

Among the land-based economic activities of the Rio Caninde valley are the exploitation of Brazilian Wax palms (Copernicia prunifera) for the manufacture of carnauba wax, the extraction and commercialization of rubber from the Pará rubber tree (Hevea brasiliensis), and maniçoba (tapioca) from the Manioc plant (Manihot esculenta), and cattle ranching including dairy farming.

Etymology

The name of the river comes from the Tupi-Guarani Kanindé, and has several meanings:

  • a tribe of Indians that inhabited the banks of rivers Quixeramobim and Banabuiú;
  • a large tribe of the Tarairyu nation, that lived in the central region of the backlands of Ceará (Quixada, Canindé and High Banabuiú, Quixeramobim);
  • a macaw with blue and yellow plumage, specifically Canindéyu from Kanindé, blue macaw + ju, yellow: the blue-and-yellow macaw (Ara ararauna, called Arara-caninde in Portuguese).[3]

See also

Notes
  1. Originally Piauhi, the river from which the province derives its name

References
  1. Spix, Johann Baptist von; Martius, C. F. P. von (2013). "Book seventh Chapter 2". Travels in Brazil, in the Years 1817-1820: Undertaken by Command of His Majesty the King of Bavaria. Vol. 2. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781108063821.
  2. Pellerin, J. (1984). Les bases physiques. In: GUIDON, N. (org.). L'aire archéologique du sud-est du Piauí. Paris: Recherche sur les Civilisations. pp. 11–12.
  3. Collar; et al. (1992). Threatened Birds of the Americas.

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