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The Nisqually River has its origins in the snow melt from the Nisqually Glacier on Mt. Rainier in Washington, USA. The river runs milky white due to "glacial flour" — the powder of boulders pulverized by the Nisqually Glacier as it creeps down along the flank of the mountain. Boulders and uprooted tree stumps, washed down by past lahars — mudflows caused by rapid glacial meltoff — litter the river bed along the Nisqually's route.