Instruct: Given a question, retrieve relevant passages that answer the question.
Query: Where does the Danube River originate?
Classified as an international waterway, it originates in the town of Donaueschingen, in the Black Forest of Germany, at the confluence of the rivers Brigach and Breg. The Danube then flows southeast for about 2,730km (1,700mi), passing through four capital cities (Vienna, Bratislava, Budapest and Belgrade) before emptying into the Black Sea via the Danube Delta in Romania and Ukraine.
The Pasărea River is a right tributary of the river Parapanca in Romania. It discharges into the Parapanca in Malu. Initially it was a branch of the Danube, linked to a branch of the river Vedea. During the embankment of the Danube flood plain in the 1960s, a new link canal was excavated linking the upper part of the old branch to the Danube, near the village of Pietroșani.
The International Commission for the Protection of the Danube River (ICPDR) is an international organisation with its permanent secretariat in Vienna. It was established by the Danube River Protection Convention, signed by the Danube countries in Sofia, Bulgaria, in 1994.
The Commissions of the Danube River were authorized by the Treaty of Paris (1856) after the close of the Crimean War. One of these international commissions, the most successful, was the European Commission of the Danube, or, in French, Commission Européenne du Danube, the CED, which had authority over the three mouths of the river — the Chilia in the north, the Sulina in the middle, and the St. George in the south and which was originally designed to last for only two years. Instead, it lasted eighty-two years. A separate commission, the International Danube Commission, or IDC, was authorized to control commerce and improvements upriver beyond the Danube Delta and was supposed to be permanent, but it was not formally organized until after 1918.
Kleine Donau is a river of Bavaria, Germany. Originally a branch of the Danube, it does not receive water from the Danube anymore. It starts at the confluence of the Wellenbach and the "Flutkanal Kleine Donau", a branch of the Ilm, near Vohburg. It flows into the Danube near Pförring.
The town lies on the Abens river, a tributary of the Danube, around eight kilometres from the river's source. The area around Abensberg is characterized by the narrow valley of the Danube, where the Weltenburg Abbey stands, the valley of the Altmühl in the north, a left tributary of the Danube, and the famous Hallertau hops-planting region in the south. The town is divided into the municipalities of Abensberg, Arnhofen, Holzharlanden, Hörlbach, Offenstetten, Pullach and Sandharland.
The Danube River has been a trade waterway for centuries, but with the rise of international borders and the jealousies of national states, commerce and shipping has often been hampered for narrow reasons. In addition, natural features of the river, most notably the sanding of the delta, has often hampered international trade. For these reasons, diplomats over the decades have worked to internationalize the Danube River in an attempt to allow commerce to flow as smoothly as possible.
Rivalry among the great powers — particularly Great Britain and Russia — hindered such cooperation, but in 1856, at the end of the Crimean War, and it was finally decided to establish an international organization where they all could work together on behalf of the Danube.
The Danube was once a long-standing frontier of the Roman Empire, and today flows through 10 countries, more than any other river in the world. Originating in Germany, the Danube flows southeast for 2,850km (1,770mi), passing through or bordering Austria, Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia, Serbia, Romania, Bulgaria, Moldova and Ukraine before draining into the Black Sea. Its drainage basin extends into nine more countries. The Danube river basin is home to fish species such as pike, zander, huchen, Wels catfish, burbot and tench. It is also home to a large diversity of carp and sturgeon, as well as salmon and trout. A few species of euryhaline fish, such as European seabass, mullet, and eel, inhabit the Danube delta and the lower portion of the river.
Running from Saint-Nazaire on the mouth of the River Loire along that river eastward through France, EV6 passes over the border to Switzerland to Lake Constance and then on to Tuttlingen in Germany, where it begins its way down the Danube following the (Danube Cycle Route). It follows that river, Europe's second longest, through Germany, Austria, Slovakia, Hungary, Serbia, Bulgaria and Romania to the river's mouth at the Danube Delta. It then continues southwards to end in Constanța, on the Black Sea.
EV7 runs from the North Cape to Malta, will whisk you from the Arctic Circle in Norway, the land of the midnight sun, to island hopping in the Mediterranean.
The racer goby inhabits but is non-indigenous in the rivers of the Baltic basin, including the Bug and Vistula. It was also introduced in the Middle Danube, in Hungary. The westernmost locality of this species range is the German sector of the Danube River, where this fish occurred first in 2011. The information about the introduction of this species to the Lower Rhine River is considered erroneous.
The Jegrička is "samica" ("lone river"), or the river that has no spring as such, but it forms from several natural draining canals from the marshes. It originates south of the Pivnice village, in the central Bačka. The river flows in the eastern direction whole of its course. It passes next to the villages of Despotovo, Ravno Selo, Zmajevo and Sirig, parallel to the Canal Danube-Tisa-Danube and Mali Kanal. Near the town of Temerin, the Jegrička forms an arc to the north, flows next to the Gospođinci village and into the marshes of Žabalj to the south, where its waters are used for the Jegrička fish pond, with an area of . The river continues eastward, on the northern side of the "Jurišna humka" hillock () and empties into the Tisa.
The dispute regarding the border along the Danube River valley first arose in 1947 but was left unresolved during the existence of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. It became a contentious issue after the breakup of Yugoslavia. Serbia holds the opinion that the thalweg of the Danube valley and the centerline of the river represents the international border between the two countries. Croatia disagrees and claims that the international border lies along the boundaries of the cadastral municipalities located along the river—departing from the course at several points—reflecting the course of the Danube which existed in the 19th century before meandering and hydraulic engineering works altered its course. As a result, Croatia claims a large part of the disputed area controlled by Serbia, while Serbia does not claim the much smaller parts controlled by Croatia.
The Tara and Lim rivers, two major sources of the Dinaric river system, originate on the northern borders of the Prokletije. The Vërmosh originates in the northwest mountainous part in Montenegro, close to the border with Albania. As a tributary of the Drina it drains into the Danube and then into the Black Sea. The Lim flows through the Plav lake. The Ibar, which originates on the slopes of the Hajla, takes a similar route into the Danube via the West Morava in Serbia.
The district is named after the Danube River (German "Donau") and the Swabian Alb ("Schwäbische Alb") mountains. The Danube enters the district in the southwest, runs through the southern parts of the district and leaves eastwards to Ulm. North of the Danube banks the hills of the Swabian Alb rise. The hill chain extends from southwest to northeast parallel to the course of the Danube River and is continued on either side of the district. An affluent of the Danube, the Iller River, forms the southeastern border of the Alb-Donau district, before it meets the Danube in Ulm.
Industries are located mostly in the southern and eastern districts. The Innere Stadt is situated away from the main flow of the Danube, but is bounded by the Donaukanal ("Danube canal"). Vienna's second and twentieth districts are located between the Donaukanal and the Danube River. Across the Danube, where the Vienna International Centre is located (districts 21–22), and in the southern areas (district 23) are the newest parts of the city.
Twenty water streams originate in the area of Bratislava. Four rivers flow through the area of the city: Danube, Morava river, Little Danube and partially Malina.
EAEMDR was established as an organization in 1935 under the name “Danube Hydrographical Service” within the structure of the Ministry of Railways. The headquarters were situated in the city of Lom and the responsibilities of the Service were related to the maintenance of the waterway, creation of maps of the Danube River, conduction of hydro meteorological surveys in the Bulgarian section of the river. In 1949, after the ratification of the “Convention for the sailing regime on the Danube River”, the Danube Hydrographical Service passed over to the Ministry of Defense – Danube Fleet. Four years later the service was reinstated as a part of the Ministry of Transport, information technology and communications and the Navigational Waterway Office was established in Ruse. In the year 1955 the organization passed over under the structure of the Bulgarian River Fleet and in the next year the Council of Ministers adopted a decree, by the force of which the Navigational Waterway Office was restructured into the “Administration for the Maintenance of the Navigational Waterway and Exploration of the Danube River” within the Ministry of Transport, Information technology and communications. 
In December 1999 the Administration was transformed into the Executive Agency for Exploration and Maintenance of the Danube River.
The Jieț River is a left tributary of the river Danube in Romania. It discharges into the Danube near Bechet.
The Camenița River is a small left tributary of the river Danube in Romania. It discharges into the Danube near Gornea.
The Danube glaciation or Donau glaciation (), also known as the Danube Glacial ("Donau-Glazial"), is a glacial stage of the Pleistocene epoch. It does not appear in the traditional, quadripartite ice age schema of the Alps by Albrecht Penck. The Danube stage was named by Barthel Eberl in 1930 after the River Danube. The Danube Glacial is the oldest glaciation in the Alps for which there is evidence outside of the Iller-Lech region. The Danube Stage was preceded by the Biber-Danube interglacial and followed by the Danube-Günz interglacial.
The Danube Bike Trail starts at the origin of the Danube and ends where the river flows into the Black Sea. It is divided into four sections:
In Passau the Inn finally enters the Danube (as does the river Ilz there). Although the Inn has a greater average flow than the Danube when they converge in Passau, and its watershed contains the Piz Bernina also the highest point in the Danube watershed, the Inn is considered a tributary of the Danube, which has a greater length, drains a larger surface area, and has a more consistent flow.
The Inn is the only river originating in Switzerland that ends in the Black Sea (via the Danube).Average monthly flow (m³/s) of the Inn in Passau
Years 1921/2006
The Balkan Mountains divide Bulgaria into two nearly equal drainage systems. The larger system drains northward to the Black Sea, mainly by way of the Danube. This system includes the entire Danubian Plain and a stretch of land running 48–80 km inland from the coastline in the south. The Danube gets slightly more than 4% of its total volume from its Bulgarian tributaries. As it flows along the northern border, the Danube averages 1.6 to 2.4 km in width. The river's highest water levels usually occur during the May floods; it is frozen over an average of 40 days per year. The longest river located entirely in Bulgarian territory, the Iskar, with a length of 368 km and a catchment area of 8,640 km, is the only Bulgarian Danubian tributary that does not rise in the Balkan Mountains. Instead, the Iskar has its origin in the Rila Mountains. It passes through Sofia's eastern suburbs and crosses the Balkan Mountains through a spectacular 65 km–long gorge. Other important tributaries of the Danube include the rivers Lom, Ogosta, Vit, Osam and Yantra. The longest river flowing directly to the Black Sea is the Kamchiya (254 km), while other rivers include the Batova, Provadiya, Aheloy, Ropotamo, Veleka and Rezovo.
It is present in lagoons and estuaries of the north-western Black Sea, near the Bulgarian coast, especially in lakes Mandra, Vaya, Varna, Beloslavsko. In the Danube River the original distribution of the bighead goby reached Vidin and was common in the lakes of the Danube delta. It inhabits the rivers Dniester up to Kamianets-Podilskyi, small rivers Zbruch and Bystrytsia. Dnieper up to Dnipropetrovsk, also in the Southern Bug River.
Orșova (; , , , , , , ) is a port city on the Danube river in southwestern Romania's Mehedinți County. It is one of four localities in the county located in the Banat historical region. It is situated just above the Iron Gates, on the spot where the Cerna River meets the Danube.