The Heart River is a 4.8 miles (7.7 km) river in the U.S. state

U.S. state

A U.S. state is any one of the 50 federated states of the United States of America that share sovereignty with the federal government. Because of this shared sovereignty, an American is a citizen both of the federal entity and of his or her state of domicile. Four states use the official title of...

 of Wyoming

Wyoming

Wyoming is a state in the mountain region of the Western United States. The western two thirds of the state is covered mostly with the mountain ranges and rangelands in the foothills of the Eastern Rocky Mountains, while the eastern third of the state is high elevation prairie known as the High...

, tributary to the Snake River

Snake River

The Snake is a major river of the greater Pacific Northwest in the United States. At long, it is the largest tributary of the Columbia River, the largest North American river that empties into the Pacific Ocean...

. Its entire course is contained inside Yellowstone National Park

Yellowstone National Park

Yellowstone National Park, established by the U.S. Congress and signed into law by President Ulysses S. Grant on March 1, 1872, is a national park located primarily in the U.S. state of Wyoming, although it also extends into Montana and Idaho...

. The river rises on the Continental Divide, in the Rocky Mountains

Rocky Mountains

The Rocky Mountains are a major mountain range in western North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch more than from the northernmost part of British Columbia, in western Canada, to New Mexico, in the southwestern United States...

, a few miles southeast of Yellowstone Lake

Yellowstone Lake

Yellowstone Lake is the largest body of water in Yellowstone National Park, The lake is 7,732 feet above sea level and covers with 110 miles of shoreline. While the average depth of the lake is 139 feet its deepest spot is at least 390 feet...

. Its headwater streams flow into Heart Lake

Heart Lake (Wyoming)

Heart Lake el. is a large backcountry lake, nestled at the base of Mount Sheridan in Yellowstone National Park. Heart Lake is in the Snake River drainage and is drained by the Heart River.-History:...

, from whose southeastern end the main Heart River issues, receiving two tributary streams from the northeast and flowing southwest into a short but steep gorge. It then continues generally south for roughly 4 miles (6 km) before emptying into the Snake near the boundary with the Teton National Forest

Teton National Forest

Teton National Forest was first established by the General Land Office on February 22, 1897 as the Teton Forest Reserve with . A commission was established in 1896 to plan for a system of national forest reserves, recommending an expansion of the territory protected by the Yellowstone Timberland...

.