Amazon River

The Amazon River is the second longest in the world and the is the largest river by volume. Flowing from Lake Lauricocha in the Peruvian Andes, the Amazon flows across the continent of South America through over 1,500 tributaries and sub tributaries to empty into the Atlantic Ocean.Seventeen of these tributaries are over one thousand miles long.http://www.worldatlas.com/webimage/countrys/salnd.htm

Along the River's journey, the swiftly flowing river picks up a great deal of nutrient rich soil, which is then deposited in the Amazon Basin during yearly floods, which can see river levels rising as much as thirty feet.
The River irrigates almost half of the continent and receives rainfall on average of 200 days a year. Much of the River is up to six miles wide and during flood season it has been seen to be up to twenty miles wide in some places.http://rainforests.mongabay.com/amazon/

Where the Amazon River empties into the Atlantic ocean it has changed the water from salt to fresh for almost 200 miles out to sea. That was what led the first sailors to discover the river, finding fresh water in the middle of the Atlantic ocean. They followed the trail back to the Amazon basin and discovered the Amazon River pouring billions of gallons of fresh water into the ocean. It actually turns the ocean into fresh water for miles out into the ocean.http://geography.about.com/od/specificplacesofinterest/a/amazonriver8.htm

The Amazon Basin is about the size of the forty-eight contiguous United States. The rain forest covers 40% of the South American Continent.

The drainage basin of the Amazon River creates the largest rainforest in the world, which has the greatest diversity of plant species in the world and is home to over 2,000 species of birds and mammals. Many of these species are not found anywhere else on earth and are considered to be severely endangered.