5 January 2015

Lakes

The picture above - snipped from Google Maps - is a very small part of central Canada. Look at all those lakes! Even in that little rectangle there seem to be countless lakes. Out of idle curiosity I discovered that Canada has over three million lakes - about 60% of all the freshwater lakes in the world. 31,752 of Canada's lakes are over three square kilometres in area and 9% of Canada's total area is taken up by lakes. Amazingly, many of the lakes we can see courtesy of Google satellite imagery have still never been visited by human beings. 
Lake Pingualuk, Canada

19 comments:

  1. Fascinating! I found out last week from another blogger that there are arid deserts in South America where nothing at all grows. My general knowledge of World geography continues to be expanded. So what are you going to do about all those lakes YP? Imagine, there could be unidentified fish and frogs and plants if no one has ever been to these lakes.

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    1. I am glad that you also found this fascinating Carol. Of course there won't be as much diversity as in say The Amazon Basin, but you are right there must still be things to discover You are hereby appointed the new SFUCLCE (Self Funding Unvisited Canadian Lakes Chief Explorer). Remember your insect spray!

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  2. Many of them have incredible colouring too. Off to visit some???

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    1. I have spotted a particularly beautiful lake in Manitoba - where wild flowers grow and elk swim - which I hereby name Lake Helen. If you send me the money I will go there and photograph it for you.

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    2. Pfht ! I have my very own photographer here ... and he takes me on photo gathering trips with him !!

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  3. Wow! After looking at that small part of Canada's map, I would have thought the area taken up by lakes is much more than 9 %. One wonders how there is ever enough room for towns and cities.

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    1. It is of course an unbelievably big country and there are large areas without lakes. Lake Arian is very popular with fishermen.

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  4. That's a lot of lakes. And when you realise that all the bits that aren't blue are covered by trees it's even better!

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    1. In the summertime, large areas of Canada are very difficult to visit because of insects - endless clouds of them. They even repelled native Americans before European settlers arrived.

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    2. A bit like Scotland ???

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    3. Native Americans didn't live in Scotland Helen.

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    4. Hoi Helsie what an unconscionable slur on this wonderful country.

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  5. Looks like an extinct volcano. Must be marvellous to climb up there and find it!

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    1. I read that that crater lake is one of the deepest in North America and that it contains some of the clearest, purest fresh water on the planet.

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  6. Of course, here in the USA we have Crater Lake in Oregon. Though not formed by a meteor (it's part of the Cascade Range volcanic chain) it, too, is not fed by outside sources other than snow & rainfall. It has much the same appearance with jagged outside edges and being rather round and stunning. An amazing planet we live on.

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    1. I didn't know about that lake Hilly but I just copied this bit of information from Wikipedia-
      In June 1853, John Wesley Hillman became the first non-native American explorer to report sighting the lake he named the "Deep Blue Lake." The lake was renamed at least three times, as Blue Lake, Lake Majesty, and finally Crater Lake.

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  7. It certainly is an interesting earth upon which we roam...some further and more often than others.

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    1. By the way Lee - Congratulations on your "Australian Blogger of the Year" award!

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  8. What fascinating things one learns in the University of Blogland.

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Mr Pudding welcomes all genuine comments - even those with which he disagrees. However, puerile or abusive comments from anonymous contributors will continue to be given the short shrift they deserve. Any spam comments that get through Google/Blogger defences will also be quickly deleted.

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