Lake Erie

Categories: Great Lakes | Lakes of Ohio | Great Lakes Waterway | Saint Lawrence Seaway | Erie Canal

Lake Erie, looking southward from a high rural bluff near Leamington, Ontario

Lake Erie is one of the five large freshwater Great Lakes in North America, among the world's largest such lakes. Lake Erie itself is the world's 13th largest natural lake, if the Caspian and Aral Seas are counted. It is named after the Erie tribe of Native Americans who lived along its southern shore before European contact.

It has a surface area of 24,000 km² (10,000 sq. miles), an average depth of 19 meters (62 feet), and a retention time of 2.6 years. It contains 483 cubic kilometers of water. For comparison, Lake Superior has an average depth of 483 feet (147 m), a volume of 12,232 cubic km and a retention time of 191 years.

Lake Erie is primarily fed by the Detroit River (from Lake Huron and Lake St. Clair) and drains via the Niagara River and Niagara Falls into Lake Ontario. Navigation downstream is provided by the Welland Canal, part of the Saint Lawrence Seaway. Other major tributaries of Lake Erie include the Grand River, the River Raisin, the Maumee River, the Sandusky River and the Cuyahoga River.

The American states Ohio, Pennsylvania and New York are located to the south of Lake Erie; Michigan lies to the west, and the Canadian province of Ontario lies to the north. Point Pelee National Park, the southernmost point of the Canadian mainland, is located on a peninsula extending into the lake. Several islands are found in the western end of the lake; these belong to Ohio except for Pelee Island, which is part of Ontario.

The cities of Buffalo, New York, Erie, Pennsylvania, Toledo, Ohio, Monroe, Michigan and Cleveland, Ohio are located on the shores of Lake Erie. It was the last of the Great Lakes discovered by the French explorers, who had followed rivers out of Lake Ontario and portaged into Lake Huron.

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Frozen Lake Erie from Cleveland

Like the other Great Lakes, Erie produces lake effect snow when the first cold winds of winter pass over the warm waters, leading to south Buffalo being one of the snowiest places in the United States. The effect ends, however, when the lake freezes over, which it frequently does.

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Sour cherry orchard on Lake Erie shoreline
Leamington, Ontario

The lake is also responsible for microclimates that are important to agriculture. Along its north shore is one of the richest areas of Canada's fruit and vegetable production, and along the southeastern shore in Pennsylvania and New York is an important grape growing region.

Lake Erie is the shallowest of the Great Lakes and became famously polluted in the 1960s and 1970s (see Swill). Urban legend has described it as a dead lake, but both sport and commercial fishing have continued without interruption to the present day. Pollution in the lake did not get much attention until the great Cuyahoga River Fire in June of 1969. Pollution from Cleveland and other Ohio cities had so contaminated this tributary of Lake Erie with petrochemicals that it actually burned. The fire embarrassed state officials and impelled the U. S. federal government to impose cleanup efforts.

Environmental regulation led to a great increase in water quality and the return of fresh water fish and other biological life; however, invasive zebra mussels currently threaten the entire Lake Erie ecosystem.

Other invasive species, such as the gobi and the grass carp, have increased awareness of how fragile the lake is at the present time. During the 1970s, Lake Erie's future was jeopardized by the overabundance of phosphorus in the water, which resulted in rank smelling algal blooms fouling both cobbled and sandy beaches. A 1972 agreement between Canada and the United States has reduced the dumping and runoff of phosphorus into the lake significantly.

Still, there is controversy over whether there should be a commercial fishery on the lake. Of the 140 fish species present in Erie, commercial fleets, berthed at 11 communities along the shoreline, are restricted to keeping 11 species for their catch through the use of gill nets, while anglers have the chance to fish for 18 species with rod and reel.

Walleye and yellow perch are game fishes at the centre of the debate. Anglers -- both in the United States and Canada -- believe that the quotas set the commercial industry are over-generous, possibly leading to the crash of all fish species.

Sports fishermen, who operate by the policy of catch-and-release, are concerned that the 80 per cent of the fish harvested from the lake by the commercial industry is too high. They believe the future of the Lake Erie's fish resources should be maintained through conservation, instead of outright exploitation.

Lake Erie's shallowness also makes it particularly prone to seiches, especially during storms, when the lake water tends to pile up at one end of the lake. This can lead to huge storm surges, potentially causing damage onshore. During one storm in November 2003, the water level at Buffalo rose by 7 feet (2.1 m) with waves of 10-15 feet (3-4.5m) on top of that, for a culmulative rise of as much as 22 feet (6.7m).

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Lake Erie Islands

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History

1813: Battle of Lake Erie, Oliver Hazard Perry

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Lake Erie

Lake Erie Islands

History

See also