Guadiana Menor
The Guadiana Menor River is a river in southern Spain, one of the main tributaries of the Guadalquivir River, on its left bank. It has a total length of 182 km, and it drains a large basin of 7,251 km². Administratively, it flows through the provinces of Granada and Jaén in the autonomous community of Andalusia.
In 1977, the published a book titled Guadalquivires, which endorsed the thesis that the true is the Guadiana Menor–Barbata, considered as a single river.
Etymology
The name has an origin independent of the Guadiana River, as it derives from its original Hispanic name with the prefix Wadi, meaning valley in Arabic.Geography
The designation Guadiana Menor is usually applied to the stretch downstream of the confluence of the with the or. Its main tributaries are the and on the left bank, and the and on the right bank, in addition to those that flow into the Barbata upstream: the, the, and the, which should not be confused with the tributary of the Segura River.The Negratín Reservoir is located on the Barbata–Guardal River. In some cases, the name "Guadiana Menor" has also been applied to the stretch of water between this reservoir and the confluence with the Fardes River. Historically, this stretch was called "the Great River" due to the significant increase in flow that occurred when the Castril and Guadalentín rivers, which are more voluminous than the main river, joined the Guardal–Barbata.
No source attributes the designation Guadiana Menor to the entire course of the Barbata–Guardal, although technically they are one and the same river.
Hydrographic Basin
Its basin includes the depressions of Baza and Guadix, a former inland sea in the Pliocene that opened its waters to the Guadalquivir through the Cerrada del Negratín, forming the current Guadiana.In this former endorheic basin, sheltered from rainfall, precipitation is very scarce, which, combined with the nature of its soil, mostly composed of gypsum, causes the rivers that converge toward the Guadiana to have an intermittent and irregular character. The extensive basin encompasses territories in the provinces of Granada, Jaén, Albacete, Murcia, and Almería. The, in the hamlet of, Almería, is the point in the Guadalquivir basin where water must travel the greatest distance to reach its mouth.
The basin of the Guadiana Menor is the second largest among the tributaries of the Guadalquivir, with a surface area of 7,251 km². The largest is that of the Genil River.
The following table attempts to identify the primary and secondary tributaries of greatest length.