Pend Oreille River 1920s, there was a proposal to divert the Pend Oreille through a gravity canal to irrigate the Grand Coulee and surrounding lands in eastern Washington as part of the tentative Columbia Basin Project. These plans were later dropped with the construction of Grand Coulee Dam and a pumping plant on the Columbia River. Variant names, according to the USGS, include: Bitter Root River, Bitterroot River, Clark Fork, Clarke Fork, Clarkes Fork, Clarks Fork, Deer Lodge River, Hell Gate River, Missoula River, Pend d'Oreille River, Silver Bow River, Clark's Fork, and Pend-d'Oreille River. Pend Oreille River The Pend Oreille River (
Coulee ridgetops transitioning into tallgrass prairie when not turned into pasture or used for row crops. Coulees provide shelter from wind and concentrated water supplies to plants which would otherwise struggle to survive in the xeric sagebrush steppe. Trees are often found in riparian habitats along streams in coulees and at the base of their walls. Coulee </div> Coulee, or coulée ( or ) is a term applied rather loosely to different landforms, all of which refer to a kind of valley or drainage zone. The word "coulee" comes from the Canadian French "coulée", from the French word "couler" meaning "to