PHYSICAL OCEANOGRAPHY OF THE GULF OF MAINE 827 



the foundation for more modern knowledge of the characteristics of the Labrador 

 Current in the Grand Banks region.^" 



Schott's chief thesis — that the most southerly bounds of the Labrador Current 

 as a definite stream flow lie not far south or west of the "tail" of the Grand Banks — 

 has been corroborated by the extensive oceanographic observations taken yearly by 

 the International Ice Patrol since 1914 (Johnston, 1915; Fries, 1922 and 1923; 

 E. H. Smith, 1922 to 1927; Zeusler, 1926), both in the region of the banks and in the 

 oceanic triangle between the latter and Nova Scotia; also by the drift-bottle experi- 

 ments carried out by the Biological Board of Canada (Huntsman, 1924). 



The data gathered by the Ice Patrol are especially instructive in connection 

 with the Gulf of Maine, both because of their extent and because especial effort has 

 constantly been made to chart any extensions of the Labrador Current that might carry 

 bergs toward the west or southwest— extensions usually easily traceable by their icy 

 temperature, even if carrying no bergs with them at the time. Furthermore, the oper- 

 ations of the patrol cover the part of the year (March to July) when the Labrador 

 Current is greatest in volume as it flows southward and lowest in temperature — 

 hence, when it would be most likely to reach the coast line of Nova Scotia or the 

 Gulf of Maine, if it ever does so. 



So many oceanographic sections have now been run in various directions from 

 the tail of the Grand Banks by the patrol in various years, and between the 

 banks and Halifax, with so careful a record of all bergs since 1911, whether actually 

 sighted by the patrol cutter or reported by other ships (E. H. Smith, 1924a, chart M), 

 that it is hardly conceivable that any considerable or constant flow of icy cold water 

 from the Grand Banks region toward Nova Scotia could have escaped attention 

 during the seasons covered. 



Actually, however, not a single phenomenon of this sort has been encountered 

 during all the years of the patrol. Thus, Johnston (1915, p. 41), in his report on the 

 operations of 1914, definitely states that "as a stream, Labrador water never gets 

 west of Grand Bank " ; consequently, that the name "Labrador Current, " as applied 

 to the cold water along the eastern coast of the United States, is a misnomer. Fries 

 (1922, p. 73), in discussing the oceanographic observations during the patrol of 1921, 

 also faUed to find any evidence of the Labrador Current continuing westward from 

 the Grand Banks toward the Gulf of Maine. With the accumulated data of succes- 

 sive years, E. H. Smith (1923) describes the Labrador Current as usually reaching its 

 farthest boundary on the south and west, somewhere between latitude 42° and 43°, 

 longitude 51° and 52°, where it eddies sharply to the eastward. A similar account 

 has recently been given by the Hydrographic OfSce, United States Navy (1926). As 

 this was the case during the spring and early summer of 1923 (a year that may be 

 classed as normal, both in respect to the number of ice bergs that drifted down to 

 the tail of the Grand Banks and to temperature), and again in the ice-free season of 

 1924, E. H. Smith (1924a, p. 144) seems fully justified in his conclusion that when the 

 Labrador Current recurves westward around the tail of the banks this is "the extreme 



"Schott (1897) described small amounts of polar water as turning westward past Cape Race along the south coast of New, 

 foundland, to enter the Gulf of St. Lawrence via the northern side of Cabot Strait, where an inflowing current (i. e., setting 

 west) has often been reported. More recent studies, however, have made it seem unlikely that it extends so far. 



