The Feather River is the principal tributary of the Sacramento River, in the Sacramento Valley of Northern California. The river's main stem is about 71mi long. Its length to its most distant headwater tributary is about 220mi. Its drainage basin is about 6000sqmi. The main stem Feather River begins in Lake Oroville, where its four long tributary forks join together—the South Fork, Middle Fork, North Fork, and West Branch Feather Rivers. These and other tributaries drain part of the northern Sierra Nevada, and the extreme southern Cascades, as well as a small portion of the Sacramento Valley. The river's drainage basin above Lake Oroville is 3222sqmi, or about 53% of the whole.The Feather River and its forks were a rich center of gold mining during the 19th century. Since the 1960s, the river has provided water to central and southern California, as the main source of water for the California State Water Project. Its water is also used for hydroelectricity generation.The Feather is unique in that two of its tributaries, the North Fork and Middle Fork, originate east of the Sierra Nevada in the Diamond Mountains and breach the crest of the Sierras as they flow west.
