Tagliamento river
It is one of the last rivers in Europe to preserve its original course. You can admire its sinuous course with clear waters surrounded by a large bed of gravel.
It is located near the Passo della Mauria, at 1.195 m altitude, in the Province of Belluno, in the municipality of Lorenzago di Cadore, not far from the border between Veneto and Friuli Venezia Giulia. Along its flow passes through Carnia, the province of Udine and becomes for many km natural boundary with the province of Pordenone before and Venice later, eventually leading to the Gulf of Venice between Lignano Sabbiadoro and Bibione.
The narrowest point of its altitude reaches about 150 m wide at Pinzano’s narrow, where the river dug its passage through the rocks. The bed consists of several limestone rocks, dolomite but also sandstone and elements of volcanic origin. Because this gravel is very permeable, it easily absorbs the waters, which therefore decrease significantly throughout the course of the high plain.
The River Tagliamento is considered to be an extremely valuable and interesting ecosystem, being considered the last morphologically intact river corridor of the Alps. For much of the course, and especially in the middle stretch to Pinzano, the invasive intervention of man was almost null and river dynamics present a degree of unique naturalness in Europe. Thanks to this feature, Tagliamento is studied by universities and research institutes all over the world, and has been modeled for river re-naturalization interventions.
From a morphological point of view, the Tagliamento is characterized by its dynamism with twisted channels: numerous waterships interweave on a very large gravel bed. The variety of plant species present in the Tagliamento is remarkable: the richest is in the middle part of Amaro and Cornino, where there is an important natural reserve. The riverbed behaves like a longitudinal and latitudinal natural corridor, which connects typically mountainous habitats with those of the plain.
The regime of Tagliamento is very irregular and is therefore classified among rivers of torrential character.