PUGET SOUND, A FJORD-LIKE ESTUARY 
Alyn C. Duxbury 
Washington Sea Grant Program 
University of Washington 
Seattle, Washington 
In the Pacific Northwest there are a series of glacially scoured, inter¬ 
connected channels that form the Strait of Juan de Fuca, Georgia Strait 
in Canada, and Puget Sound in the State of Washington. Puget Sound is 
the southernmost portion of this system and centers on 47° N latitude. 
Documentation of Puget Sound dates back to Captain George Vancouver's 
exploratory visit in 1792. He penetrated the Sound as far south as 
Blake Island with the HMS Discovery and anchored. He then sent his young 
lieutenant, Peter Puget, in a small boat to explore farther inland. As a 
reward for Puget's efforts, the area south of the present Tacoma Narrows 
was named Puget's Sound. The main basin or channel between the Narrows 
and the entrance at the north was named Admiralty Inlet. Port Gardner, 
Possession Sound and Hood's Canal completed the roster of the principal 
components of this inland sea. 
No one has been willing to leave the original names alone or to retain 
their geographical relationships. Today the commonly accepted nomen¬ 
clature and subdivisions of the Sound based on defensible oceanographic 
and geographic criteria use Puget Sound to refer to the total body of 
water south and east of a line between Partridge Point on Whidbey Island 
and Point Wilson at Port Townsend. 
This body of water is then subdivided into Hood Canal, South Sound, 
Whidbey Basin and the main or central basin. Even this is not sacred and 
with each new law or regulation that pertains to the Sound, the writers 
are compelled to redefine the boundaries for Puget Sound. At present some 
legislation expands Puget Sound north and west to the Canadian boundary 
and half way out the Strait of Juan de Fuca. 
*This paper was supported by a grant from the Washington Sea Grant 
program under grant no. NA86AA-D-SG044 from the National Sea Grant 
Program, NOAA, U.S. Dept, of Commerce. 
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