Moose, Spruce, 

 and Muskeg 



The Canadian Northwest Territories 

 or Lake District 



As may be seen from our map of America's natural provinces, 

 there are three such provinces adjacent to the Arctic. Thus, in 

 leaving the great peninsular province of Quebec and Labrador 

 with its attendant islands, we enter next that vast, more or less 

 flat territory which lies athwart central Canada. We are calling 

 this the Canadian Lakes District. 



The size of this province is almost impossible to grasp even 

 by those who visit it. Probably only those who have traveled 

 therein extensively, like the Royal Canadian Mounted Police 

 who now patrol it by air, really have any true concept of its 

 extent. To gain a proper impression of this land, it is preferable 

 to approach it from the Barren Lands across the tundra from 

 the north; the impact is far more spectacular than penetrating 

 it from the south — which one can do only by canoe, by one 

 railroad, or by one road. This is a forest province and it forms 

 the second-largest continuous forest on the surface of the earth, 

 being surpassed only by the great taiga of Siberia. Let us retrace 

 our steps for a moment and imagine that we are on a walk 

 directly from the North Pole to the Equator down, say, the 

 100th meridian. This would, of course, entail an enormously 

 long trek over the polar ice raft, the great Canadian Islands and 

 the channels dividing them, and finally across the huge Keewatin 

 Peninsula. So far, even if one could make the trek in the brief 

 northern summer, we would have seen nothing but ice, snow, 

 bare rock, and tundra. What is more, we would have had to walk 

 almost two thousand miles down this particular meridian before 

 we reached the northern fringe of the great forest province that 

 we are now discussing. This is no less than one-third of our jour- 

 ney to the Equator, for it is 6215 miles from the North Pole to 

 the Equator going straight down any meridian or line of longi- 

 tude. Should one make this trek at even a rate of twenty miles 

 a day, it would be fourteen weeks before one saw a tree — which 

 is to say, reached the northern limit of this Lakes Province of 

 Canada. Then, if there was an unencumbered path leading 

 directly south through this, it would take another five weeks to 

 reach its southern boundary, which is, incidentally, the United 

 States border near Winnipeg. But perhaps even more astonishing 

 is the consideration that, should one continue south at the same 

 rate, it would take us only twelve weeks to cross the whole 

 United States — and at its deepest from north to south at that. 

 This province is on an average just one-half the depth of the 



whole United States, and measured from northeast to southwest, 

 over three-quarters its width. 



This province appears on most maps as little more than an 

 enormous stretch of featureless territory. But if you come to 

 analyze it, some hint of why it is as it is will eventually become 

 apparent. In this case a really good physiographic map such as 

 the one prepared by Dr. Edwin Raiz of Boston (which is printed 

 in black and white but with surface waters shown in blue) brings 

 to light something that is not otherwise apparent. 



One sees immediately that this whole area of the map is 

 littered with blue dots, spots, and patches, representing lakes of 

 all sizes. Their number is literally legion. But most notable is the 

 fact that these are greatest in number around the edge of Hudson 

 Bay to the east but are there smallest in size, whereas they 

 become less numerous to the west but larger. At first this seems 

 odd, but once it has been suggested that Hudson Bay may have 

 been caused in the first place by a gargantuan mass of ice pressing 

 down the earth's crust at that point, it all begins to seem much 

 more comprehensible. If we assume that this happened, a very 

 wide area all around that depression must also have been to 

 varying extents depressed. It apparently was, but the tough 

 Laurentian Shield would not so "go down." The land to the west, 

 however, apparently did so. Then, after the ice had melted away, 

 it started to spring back; but in the meantime it was flooded. 



Now we have noted that the surface of the land had become 

 deep-frozen under the icecap. Therefore it could not absorb 

 surface water. Moreover, apart from the melting ice, there was 

 very little water available in the form of precipitation, so that no 

 surface drainage system formed. The water just lay there in 

 various depressions. Then plants came in, and forests grew on 

 the slightly higher surfaces, while endless lakes and ponds 

 formed in the lower ones; then these began to fill in with humus 

 and other debris and formed what are called muskegs. The lands 

 farthest from the Hudson depression rose first and highest so 

 that more of their surfaces have drained off, only the larger 

 depressions remaining as the great Canadian lakes of the North- 

 west Territories. 



TAIGA AND MUSKEG 



And what is this land like? This is a fairly simple question to 

 answer though, paradoxically, it cannot yet be answered either 

 wholly or categorically. As far as we know from aerial recon- 

 naissance and surveys, the accounts of trappers, traders, mission- 

 aries, and others who have traveled therein, plus the accounts of 

 the Amerindians, it appears to be a fairly uniform land of con- 

 tinuous forest and what is called muskeg, endlessly intersected 

 by ponds, lakes, rivers, and sloughs. Its southern border merges 

 with a type of forest called the Transition Belt, wherein pines 

 and hardwoods grow, as opposed to the pure stands of small 

 spruce (with some aspen) or spruce, firs, and pines, which is not 

 only characteristic but actually definitive of this northwest 

 territory. Its northern edge is the northern limit of trees; and 

 most peculiar that is. 



Tropical forests or jungles often, if not usually, end abruptly. 

 Even temperate woodlands may do likewise, as in North Dakota, 



The great taiga (or spruce) forest thins out in the far north, 

 the individual trees becoming scraggly, stunted, and iso- 

 lated, and finally dying away altogether in an expanse of 

 tundra and bare rocks. Tongues of forest may reach for miles 

 onto the tundra along watercourses. 



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