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River

Besed

261 km from source to mouth · Belarus and Russia.

BelarusRussiaBelarus and RussiaFlows into Sozh

Follow the riverMonth by month

SourceMouth
The river and every tributary in its basin, drawn from RiverATLAS (CC BY 4.0).

In numbers

Length

261km

Average flow

28m³/s

Basin

5,600km²

Drop

55m

from 170 m to 115 m

Countries

2

The journey

From source to mouth

261 km of river and 9 stops on the way: 1 towns and cities on its banks, dams, bridges and the tributaries that feed it.

170 m115 m
Smolensk Uplandat 170 m0 km
Aĺšoŭkatributary38 km
Suraŭtributary86 km
Žaduńtributary98 km
Alyoshnyatributary157 km
Paluzhtributary162 km
Kolpitatributary194 km
Stolbunkatributary227 km
Sozhat 115 m261 km
0100200261 km
  1. 0 kmSmolensk Uplandat 170 m
  2. 38 kmAĺšoŭkatributary
  3. 86 kmSuraŭtributary
  4. 98 kmŽaduńtributary
  5. 111 kmDzyarazhnyatributary
  6. 157 kmAlyoshnyatributary
  7. 162 kmPaluzhtributary
  8. 169 kmKrasnaya Gora6,468 people
  9. 194 kmKolpitatributary
  10. 227 kmStolbunkatributary
  11. 261 kmSozhat 115 m

Water level along the river (RiverATLAS; the height is exaggerated). Towns: GeoNames and Wikidata; bridges, dams and tributaries: Wikidata.

River in Belarus and Russia

At the mouth it carries 28 m³/s on average: an Olympic pool every 90 seconds. It drops from 170 m to 115 m, 0.2 m per kilometre on average. Its basin covers 5,600 km², about the size of BN. 77,000 people live in it. Highest water: from April to June; lowest: from January to March. No large dam holds it back: it is one of the world's free-flowing rivers.

Read more on Wikipedia

Where to start

Besed, month by month

Highest water: from April to June

Lowest water: from January to March. Freezing months (average below −4 °C): from January to February. Best months to visit: from May to August.

28
-8°38 mmJan
19
-6°28 mmFeb
19
-2°30 mmMar
69
7°40 mmApr
66
14°46 mmMay
68
17°76 mmJun
44
18°82 mmJul
45
17°61 mmAug
43
12°53 mmSep
41
7°47 mmOct
45
1°48 mmNov
36
-4°46 mmDec
Water (estimated flow)Air (average) Rain (mm)Best months

From about 19 m³/s in the lowest month to 69 m³/s in the highest. An estimate: the monthly flow is modelled from the lowest and highest months of WaterGAP (RiverATLAS, 1971–2000) and the rain and snow along the river (WorldClim). Dams change the real rhythm. The chip is the average air temperature; below it, the month's rain.

Plan the trip

Plan the trip: boat trips, a bed by the river, a car

Some links above are affiliate links: if you book through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what the data on this page says.

The basin

Besed: the basin in numbers

5,537 km² of land send their water to this river. This is what lives on it.

Free-flowingDams upstream can hold only 0.0% of a year's flow: the river still keeps its natural rhythm.
  • 77,000people live in the basin
  • 14/km²people per km²
  • 159maverage altitude of the basin
  • 599mmof rain a year (basin average)
  • 6.0°Caverage air temperature
  • 3%protected areas

What covers the basin

  • 26% Forest
  • 41% Cropland
  • 18% Pasture
  • 1% Towns and cities

RiverATLAS (HydroATLAS v1.0, CC BY 4.0): land cover, people, protected areas, glaciers and dams over the whole basin upstream of the mouth.

Along the river

Besed: what you find on the way

  • 1Dams

From OpenStreetMap, within 1.6 km of the river. Not mapped is not the same as not there.

From space

The source and the mouth, seen from orbit

Besed: satellite view of the source
The source14 km across
Besed: satellite view of the mouth
The mouth10 km across

Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 by EOX IT Services GmbH (contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data 2016), CC BY 4.0. The glowing line is the river as drawn by RiverATLAS.

Photos

Besed in pictures

VetkaRaion2
Szeder László · CC BY-SA 3.0

Tributaries

Where it flows, and what flows into it

Tributaries (18)

Also: Suraŭ, Paluzh, Stolbunka, Žaduń, Dzyarazhnya, Alyoshnya, Aĺšoŭka, Kolpita, Muzjitjok, Vojskaja, Zhadun, Zubr, Mašoŭka, Elenka, Splavień, Aziaryščanskaja, Blahaŭka, Trastsyanka

Where these numbers come from

Name, length, placesWikidata (Q2415430) · CC0
Course, profile, basinRiverATLAS v1.0 (HydroATLAS, Linke et al. 2019) · CC BY 4.0 — followed from the source to the mouth given by Wikidata
FlowWaterGAP (RiverATLAS), 1971–2000 · CC BY 4.0
Climate along the riverWorldClim (RiverATLAS), 1970–2000 · CC BY 4.0
Towns, bridges, damsWikidata · CC0; GeoNames · CC BY 4.0
Along the river© OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL
ImagesEOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons

Every source and licence is on the data sources page.

The family

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