Agbado River

The Agbado River is a river of Benin. It flows through Maxi territory to the north of Abomey. It flows south from its source in northern Collines Department, passes the town of Savalou, and discharges into the Zou River at the Atchérigbé Classified Forest near Setto.

The Agbado River is a river in central Benin and a tributary of the Zou River, one of the two principal tributaries of the Ouémé River, the country's largest river system. The river rises in the northern part of the Collines Department, flows generally southward through the vicinity of Savalou, and joins the Zou River within the Atchérigbé Classified Forest near Setto. As part of the Ouémé drainage basin, the Agbado contributes to one of the most important hydrological systems in Benin, supplying water for agriculture, rural communities, and downstream ecosystems. The Agbado River is also shown as a tributary of the Zou River in modern cartographic representations of the Ouémé basin.

The Agbado River drains part of the crystalline basement plateau of central Benin. From its headwaters in the Collines Department, it flows through a landscape characterized by wooded savanna, agricultural land, and gallery forests before reaching the Zou River. The basin lies within the wider Ouémé watershed, which extends across much of central and southern Benin and ultimately discharges into the Gulf of Guinea through the Ouémé Delta.

The hydrological regime of the Agbado River reflects the tropical climatic conditions of central Benin. Streamflow is highly seasonal, with discharge increasing during the rainy season and declining substantially during the dry season. Because the river forms part of the Zou–Ouémé system, its flow contributes to the seasonal flood dynamics that characterize the Ouémé Basin. Hydrological studies of the Ouémé Basin indicate that river discharge is controlled primarily by seasonal rainfall, catchment geology, soil properties, and land cover. Although no long-term gauging station is known for the Agbado River itself, its behaviour is consistent with that of neighbouring tributaries of the Zou River, which experience marked wet-season floodi

Flows through: Benin.

River data from Wikidata (CC0); lengths normalised to a common unit.