River
Hayes River
551 km from source to mouth · Canada.
CanadaFlows into Hudson Bay
In numbers
Length
551km
Average flow
590m³/s
Basin
108,000km²
Drop
217m
from 217 m to 0 m
Country
1
The journey
From source to mouth
551 km of river and 40 stops on the way: 0 towns and cities on its banks, dams, bridges and the tributaries that feed it.
- 0 kmMolson Lakeat 217 m
- 3 kmMolson Lake395 km²
- 35 kmRobinson Lake18 km²
- 36 kmRobinson Falls
- 45 kmLogan Lake13 km²
- 55 kmLahti Lake1.2 km²
- 55 kmRobert Eason Smith Lake1.1 km²
- 57 kmBundy Lake0.7 km²
- 59 kmWilbert Bolton Lake0.6 km²
- 71 kmOpiminegoka Lake13 km²
- 77 kmJenner Lake1.4 km²
- 88 kmWindy Lake19 km²
- 90 kmOpikamow Lake2.2 km²
- 92 kmWipanipanis Falls
- 144 kmOxford Lake339 km²
- 150 kmBack Lake14 km²
- 152 kmSandy Lake2.1 km²
- 166 kmTrout Falls
- 169 kmMichikanes Lake2.5 km²
- 205 kmRobert Simpson Lake0.5 km²
- 218 kmBottomley Lake0.5 km²
- 236 kmOccomore Lake1.3 km²
- 243 kmHubert Havard Lake0.8 km²
- 246 kmHooper Lake2.3 km²
- 249 kmMakakaysip Lake4.4 km²
- 250 kmKnee Lake282 km²
- 257 kmWalkey Lake0.4 km²
- 259 kmDavid Adamson Lake0.7 km²
- 264 kmBotham Lake0.5 km²
- 267 kmJohn McDougall Lake1.4 km²
- 276 kmPremock Lake0.7 km²
- 278 kmJames Cunningham Lake0.8 km²
- 278 kmSwampy Lake18 km²
- 292 kmHudson Gunn Lake0.5 km²
- 302 kmBudrick Lake0.7 km²
- 304 kmVan Cooten Lake1.5 km²
- 328 kmWhitemud Falls
- 331 kmBerwick Falls
- 335 kmSekwan Lake2.0 km²
- 346 kmRapid Hill Lake2.1 km²
- 433 kmGods Rivertributary
- 551 kmHudson Bayat 0 m
Water level along the river (RiverATLAS; the height is exaggerated). Towns: GeoNames and Wikidata; bridges, dams and tributaries: Wikidata.
River in Manitoba, Canada
At the mouth it carries 590 m³/s on average: an Olympic pool every 4.2 seconds. It drops from 217 m to 0 m, 0.4 m per kilometre on average. Its basin covers 108,000 km², about the size of GT. 13,000 people live in it. Highest water: from June to August; lowest: from January to April. No large dam holds it back: it is one of the world's free-flowing rivers.
Where to start
- Churchill Airport (YYQ)Nearest airport with scheduled flights, 219 km from the cityCar hire at YTH airport (Thompson)Discover Cars · Affiliate link↗
- Kayak and canoe86 put-ins and rapids mapped (OpenStreetMap)
- From July to AugustThe best months to visit
Hayes River, month by month
Highest water: from June to August
Lowest water: from January to April. Freezing months (average below −4 °C): from November to March. Best months to visit: from July to August.
From about 770 m³/s in the lowest month to 1,100 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
Hayes River: the basin in numbers
107,550 km² of land send their water to this river. This is what lives on it.
- 13,000people live in the basin
- 0/km²people per km²
- 187maverage altitude of the basin
- 520mmof rain a year (basin average)
- -2.9°Caverage air temperature
- 3%protected areas
- 12.1%covered by lakes
- 26%permafrost
What covers the basin
- 71% Forest
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
Hayes River: what you find on the way
- 86RapidsPakisikan Rapids, Nunatonowago Rapids, Neesootakuskaywin Rapids and 83 more
From OpenStreetMap, within 2.4 km of the river. Not mapped is not the same as not there.
Cross-checked with our atlases
Hayes River in our other atlases
What our sister atlases know about the waterfalls on this river, the lakes it flows through, the beaches at its mouth, the mountains where it rises and the islands off its mouth.
5waterfalls on the riverCascadyas
34lakes on its wayLakeyas
Waterfalls (5)
On the river, by Cascadyas
- Robinson Fallskm 36
- Wipanipanis Fallskm 92
- Trout Fallskm 166
- Whitemud Fallskm 328
- Berwick Fallskm 331
Cascadyas is coming soonOpen Cascadyas ↗
Lakes and reservoirs (34)
Lakes it flows through, by Lakeyas
- Molson Lakekm 3395km²
- Robinson Lakekm 3518km²
- Opiminegoka Lakekm 7113km²
- Windy Lakekm 8819km²
- Oxford Lakekm 144339km²
- Back Lakekm 15014km²
- Knee Lakekm 250282km²
- Swampy Lakekm 27818km²
26 more on LakeyasLakeyas is coming soonOpen Lakeyas ↗
From space
The source and the mouth, seen from orbit


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.
Tributaries
Where it flows, and what flows into it
Tributaries (2)
Also: Gods River, Fox River
Where these numbers come from
| Name, length, places | Wikidata (Q72673) · CC0 |
|---|---|
| Course, profile, basin | RiverATLAS v1.0 (HydroATLAS, Linke et al. 2019) · CC BY 4.0 — followed from the source to the mouth given by Wikidata |
| Flow | WaterGAP (RiverATLAS), 1971–2000 · CC BY 4.0 |
| Climate along the river | WorldClim (RiverATLAS), 1970–2000 · CC BY 4.0 |
| Towns, bridges, dams | Wikidata · CC0; GeoNames · CC BY 4.0 |
| Along the river | © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL |
| Images | EOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons |
| Our other atlases | Cascadyas, Lakeyas — Wikidata · CC0; © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL; GeoNames · CC BY 4.0; HydroLAKES · CC BY 4.0; NOAA OISST |
Every source and licence is on the data sources page.
The family
Do you prefer beaches, lakes, mountains, waterfalls, islands, rivers or canyons?
Same idea, other landscapes: field atlases built on open data, month by month, in seven languages.