Binomial nomenclature
Binomial nomenclature called binominal nomenclature or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, both of which use Latin grammatical forms, although they can be based on words from other languages. Such a name is called a binomen, binominal name or a scientific name; the first part of the name – the generic name – identifies the genus to which the species belongs, while the second part – the specific name or specific epithet – identifies the species within the genus. For example, humans belong within this genus to the species Homo sapiens. Tyrannosaurus rex is the most known binomial; the formal introduction of this system of naming species is credited to Carl Linnaeus beginning with his work Species Plantarum in 1753. But Gaspard Bauhin, in as early as 1623, had introduced in his book Pinax theatri botanici many names of genera that were adopted by Linnaeus; the application of binomial nomenclature is now governed by various internationally agreed codes of rules, of which the two most important are the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature for animals and the International Code of Nomenclature for algae and plants.
Although the general principles underlying binomial nomenclature are common to these two codes, there are some differences, both in the terminology they use and in their precise rules. In modern usage, the first letter of the first part of the name, the genus, is always capitalized in writing, while that of the second part is not when derived from a proper noun such as the name of a person or place. Both parts are italicized when a binomial name occurs in normal text, thus the binomial name of the annual phlox is now written as Phlox drummondii. In scientific works, the authority for a binomial name is given, at least when it is first mentioned, the date of publication may be specified. In zoology "Patella vulgata Linnaeus, 1758"; the name "Linnaeus" tells the reader who it was that first published a description and name for this species of limpet. "Passer domesticus". The original name given by Linnaeus was Fringilla domestica; the ICZN does not require that the name of the person who changed the genus be given, nor the date on which the change was made, although nomenclatorial catalogs include such information.
In botany "Amaranthus retroflexus L." – "L." is the standard abbreviation used in botany for "Linnaeus". "Hyacinthoides italica Rothm. – Linnaeus first named this bluebell species Scilla italica. The name is composed of two word-forming elements: "bi", a Latin prefix for two, "-nomial", relating to a term or terms; the word "binomium" was used in Medieval Latin to mean a two-term expression in mathematics. Prior to the adoption of the modern binomial system of naming species, a scientific name consisted of a generic name combined with a specific name, from one to several words long. Together they formed a system of polynomial nomenclature; these names had two separate functions. First, to designate or label the species, second, to be a diagnosis or description. In a simple genus, containing only two species, it was easy to tell them apart with a one-word genus and a one-word specific name; such "polynomial names" may sometimes look like binomials, but are different. For example, Gerard's herbal describes various kinds of spiderwort: "The first is called Phalangium ramosum, Branched Spiderwort.
The other... is aptly termed Phalangium Ephemerum Virginianum, Soon-Fading Spiderwort of Virginia". The Latin phrases are short descriptions, rather than identifying labels; the Bauhins, in particular Caspar Bauhin, took some important steps towards the binomial system, by pruning the Latin descriptions, in many cases to two words. The adoption by biologists of a system of binomial nomenclature is due to Swedish botanist and physician Carl von Linné, more known by his Latinized name Carl Linnaeus, it was in his 1753 Species Plantarum that he first began using a one-word "trivial name" together with a generic name in a system of binomial nomenclature. This trivial name is what is now known as specific name; the Bauhins' genus names were retained in many of these, but the descriptive part was reduced to a single word. Linnaeus's trivial names introduced an important new idea, namely that the function of a name could be to give a species a unique label; this meant. Thus Gerard's Phalangium ephemerum virginianum became Tradescantia virgi
Chordate
A chordate is an animal constituting the phylum Chordata. During some period of their life cycle, chordates possess a notochord, a dorsal nerve cord, pharyngeal slits, an endostyle, a post-anal tail: these five anatomical features define this phylum. Chordates are bilaterally symmetric; the Chordata and Ambulacraria together form the superphylum Deuterostomia. Chordates are divided into three subphyla: Vertebrata. There are extinct taxa such as the Vetulicolia. Hemichordata has been presented as a fourth chordate subphylum, but now is treated as a separate phylum: hemichordates and Echinodermata form the Ambulacraria, the sister phylum of the Chordates. Of the more than 65,000 living species of chordates, about half are bony fish that are members of the superclass Osteichthyes. Chordate fossils have been found from as early as the Cambrian explosion, 541 million years ago. Cladistically, vertebrates - chordates with the notochord replaced by a vertebral column during development - are considered to be a subgroup of the clade Craniata, which consists of chordates with a skull.
The Craniata and Tunicata compose the clade Olfactores. Chordates form a phylum of animals that are defined by having at some stage in their lives all of the following anatomical features: A notochord, a stiff rod of cartilage that extends along the inside of the body. Among the vertebrate sub-group of chordates the notochord develops into the spine, in wholly aquatic species this helps the animal to swim by flexing its tail. A dorsal neural tube. In fish and other vertebrates, this develops into the spinal cord, the main communications trunk of the nervous system. Pharyngeal slits; the pharynx is the part of the throat behind the mouth. In fish, the slits are modified to form gills, but in some other chordates they are part of a filter-feeding system that extracts particles of food from the water in which the animals live. Post-anal tail. A muscular tail that extends backwards behind the anus. An endostyle; this is a groove in the ventral wall of the pharynx. In filter-feeding species it produces mucus to gather food particles, which helps in transporting food to the esophagus.
It stores iodine, may be a precursor of the vertebrate thyroid gland. There are soft constraints that separate chordates from certain other biological lineages, but are not part of the formal definition: All chordates are deuterostomes; this means. All chordates are based on a bilateral body plan. All chordates are coelomates, have a fluid filled body cavity called a coelom with a complete lining called peritoneum derived from mesoderm; the following schema is from the third edition of Vertebrate Palaeontology. The invertebrate chordate classes are from Fishes of the World. While it is structured so as to reflect evolutionary relationships, it retains the traditional ranks used in Linnaean taxonomy. Phylum Chordata †Vetulicolia? Subphylum Cephalochordata – Class Leptocardii Clade Olfactores Subphylum Tunicata – Class Ascidiacea Class Thaliacea Class Appendicularia Class Sorberacea Subphylum Vertebrata Infraphylum incertae sedis Cyclostomata Superclass'Agnatha' paraphyletic Class Myxini Class Petromyzontida or Hyperoartia Class †Conodonta Class †Myllokunmingiida Class †Pteraspidomorphi Class †Thelodonti Class †Anaspida Class †Cephalaspidomorphi Infraphylum Gnathostomata Class †Placodermi Class Chondrichthyes Class †Acanthodii Superclass Osteichthyes Class Actinopterygii Class Sarcopterygii Superclass Tetrapoda Class Amphibia Class Sauropsida Class Synapsida Craniates, one of the three subdivisions of chordates, all have distinct skulls.
They include the hagfish. Michael J. Benton commented that "craniates are characterized by their heads, just as chordates, or all deuterostomes, are by their tails". Most craniates are vertebrates; these consist of a series of bony or cartilaginous cylindrical vertebrae with neural arches that protect the spinal cord, with projections that link the vertebrae. However hagfish have incomplete braincases and no vertebrae, are therefore not regarded as vertebrates, but as members of the craniates, the group from which vertebrates are thought to have evolved; however the cladistic exclusion of hagfish from the vertebrates is controversial, as they ma
FishBase
FishBase is a global species database of fish species. It is the most extensively accessed online database on adult finfish on the web. Over time it has "evolved into a dynamic and versatile ecological tool", cited in scholarly publications. FishBase provides comprehensive species data, including information on taxonomy, geographical distribution and morphology, behaviour and habitats and population dynamics as well as reproductive and genetic data. There is access to tools such as trophic pyramids, identification keys, biogeographical modelling and fishery statistics and there are direct species level links to information in other databases such as LarvalBase, GenBank, the IUCN Red List and the Catalog of Fishes; as of November 2018, FishBase included descriptions of 34,000 species and subspecies, 323,200 common names in 300 languages, 58,900 pictures, references to 55,300 works in the scientific literature. The site has about 700,000 unique visitors per month; the origins of FishBase go back to the 1970s, when the fisheries scientist Daniel Pauly found himself struggling to test a hypothesis on how the growing ability of fish was affected by the size of their gills.
Hypotheses, such as this one, could be tested only if large amounts of empirical data were available. At the time, fisheries management used analytical models which required estimates for fish growth and mortality, it can be difficult for fishery scientists and managers to get the information they need on the species that concern them, because the relevant facts can be scattered across and buried in numerous journal articles, reports and other sources. It can be difficult for people in developing countries who need such information. Pauly believed that the only practical way fisheries managers could access the volume of data they needed was to assemble and consolidate all the data available in the published literature into some central and accessed repository; such a database would be useful if the data has been standardised and validated. This would mean that when scientists or managers need to test a new hypothesis, the available data will be there in a validated and accessible form, there will be no need to create a new dataset and have to validate it.
Pauly recruited Rainer Froese, the beginnings of a software database along these lines was encoded in 1988. This database confined to tropical fish, became the prototype for FishBase. FishBase was subsequently extended to cover all finfish, was launched on the Web in August 1996, it is now the most accessed online database for fish in the world. In 1995 the first CD-ROM was released as "FishBase 100". Subsequent CDs have been released annually; the software runs on Microsoft Access. FishBase does not detail the early and juvenile stages of fish. In 1999 a complimentary database, called LarvalBase, went online under the supervision of Bernd Ueberschär, it covers ichthyoplankton and the juvenile stage of fishes, with detailed data on fish eggs and larvae, fish identification, as well as data relevant to the rearing of young fish in aquaculture. Given FishBase's success, there was a demand for a database covering forms of aquatic life other than finfish; this resulted, in the birth of SeaLifeBase. The long-term goal of SeaLifeBase is to develop an information system modelled on FishBase, but including all forms of aquatic life, both marine and freshwater, apart from the finfish which FishBase specialises in.
Altogether, there are about 300,000 known species in this category. As awareness of FishBase has grown among fish specialists, it has attracted over 2,310 contributors and collaborators. Since 2000 FishBase has been supervised by a consortium of nine international institutions. To date, the FishBase consortium has grown to twelve members; the GEOMAR - Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research for Ocean Research Kiel in Germany, functions as the coordinating body. Catalog of Fishes List of online encyclopedias Bailly N Why there may be discrepancies in the assessment of scientific names between the Catalog of Fishes and FishBase Version 2, 6 May 2010. Bailly N, Reyes Jr R, Atanacio R and Froese R "Simple Identification Tools in FishBase" In: Nimis PL and Vignes Lebbe R. Tools for Identifying Biodiversity: Progress and Problems, pages 31–36. ISBN 978-88-8303-295-0. Christensen V, CJ Walters, R Ahrens, J Alder, J Buszowski, LB Christensen, WWL Cheung, J Dunne, R Froese, V Karpouzi, K Kaschner, K Kearney, S Lai, V Lam, MLD Palomares, A Peters-Mason, C Piroddia, JL Sarmiento, J Steenbeek, R Sumaila, R Watson, D Zeller and D Pauly Database-driven models of the world's Large Marine Ecosystems Ecological Modelling, 220: 1984–1996.
Froese R "The science in Fishbase" In: Villy Christensen and Jay Maclean Ecosystem Approaches to Fisheries: A Global Perspective, Cambridge University Press, pages 47–54. ISBN 978-0-521-13022-6. Froese R and Pauly D FishBase 2000: concepts and data sources ICLARM, Philippines. Froese R and Pauly D "Fishbase as a tool for comparing the life history patterns of flatfish" Netherlands Journal of Sea Research, 32: 235–239. Nauen CE A public electronic archive on the world’s fishes in support of sustainable fisheries CTA/Commonwealth Secretariat Seminar, Expert Meeting on ACP-EU Fisheries Relations, Brussels. Palomares, M. L. D. N. Bailly and D. Pauly FishBase, SeaLifeBase and database-driven ecosystem modeling p. 156-158. In: M. L. D. Palomares, L. Morissette, A. Cisnero-Montemayor, D. Varkey, M. Coll and C. Piroddi Ecopath 25 Years Conference Proceedings: Extended Abstracts. UBC Fisheries Centre Resear
Actinopterygii
Actinopterygii, or the ray-finned fishes, constitute a class or subclass of the bony fishes. The ray-finned fishes are so called because their fins are webs of skin supported by bony or horny spines, as opposed to the fleshy, lobed fins that characterize the class Sarcopterygii; these actinopterygian fin rays attach directly to the proximal or basal skeletal elements, the radials, which represent the link or connection between these fins and the internal skeleton. Numerically, actinopterygians are the dominant class of vertebrates, comprising nearly 99% of the over 30,000 species of fish, they are ubiquitous throughout freshwater and marine environments from the deep sea to the highest mountain streams. Extant species can range in size from Paedocypris, at 8 mm, to the massive ocean sunfish, at 2,300 kg, the long-bodied oarfish, at 11 m. Ray-finned fishes occur in many variant forms; the main features of a typical ray-finned fish are shown in the adjacent diagram. In nearly all ray-finned fish, the sexes are separate, in most species the females spawn eggs that are fertilized externally with the male inseminating the eggs after they are laid.
Development proceeds with a free-swimming larval stage. However other patterns of ontogeny exist, with one of the commonest being sequential hermaphroditism. In most cases this involves protogyny, fish starting life as females and converting to males at some stage, triggered by some internal or external factor. Protandry, where a fish converts from male to female, is much less common than protogyny. Most families use external rather than internal fertilization. Of the oviparous teleosts, most do not provide parental care. Viviparity, ovoviviparity, or some form of parental care for eggs, whether by the male, the female, or both parents is seen in a significant fraction of the 422 teleost families. Viviparity is rare and is found in about 6% of teleost species. Male territoriality "preadapts" a species for evolving male parental care. There are a few examples of fish; the mangrove rivulus is an amphibious, simultaneous hermaphrodite, producing both eggs and spawn and having internal fertilisation.
This mode of reproduction may be related to the fish's habit of spending long periods out of water in the mangrove forests it inhabits. Males are produced at temperatures below 19 °C and can fertilise eggs that are spawned by the female; this maintains genetic variability in a species, otherwise inbred. The earliest known fossil actinopterygiian is Andreolepis hedei. Remains have been found in Russia and Estonia. Actinopterygians are divided into the subclasses Neopterygii; the Neopterygii, in turn, are divided into the infraclasses Teleostei. During the Mesozoic and Cenozoic the teleosts in particular diversified and as a result, 96% of all known fish species are teleosts; the cladogram shows the major groups of actinopterygians and their relationship to the terrestrial vertebrates that evolved from a related group of fish. Approximate dates are from al.. 2012. The polypterids are the sister lineage of all other actinopterygians, the Acipenseriformes are the sister lineage of Neopterygii, Holostei are the sister lineage of teleosts.
The Elopomorpha appears to be the most basic teleosts. The listing below follows Phylogenetic Classification of Bony Fishes with notes when this differs from Nelson, ITIS and FishBase and extinct groups from Van der Laan 2016. Order †? Asarotiformes Schaeffer 1968 Order †? Discordichthyiformes Minikh 1998 Order †? Paphosisciformes Grogan & Lund 2015 Order †? Scanilepiformes Selezneya 1985 Order †Cheirolepidiformes Kazantseva-Selezneva 1977 Order †Paramblypteriformes Heyler 1969 Order †Rhadinichthyiformes Order †Palaeonisciformes Hay 1902 Order †Tarrasiiformes sensu Lund & Poplin 2002 Order †Ptycholepiformes Andrews et al. 1967 Order †Redfieldiiformes Berg 1940 Order †Haplolepidiformes Westoll 1944 Order †Aeduelliformes Heyler 1969 Order †Platysomiformes Aldinger 1937 Order †Dorypteriformes Cope 1871 Order †Eurynotiformes Sallan & Coates 2013 Subclass Cladistii Pander 1860 Order †Guildayichthyiformes Lund 2000 Order Polypteriformes Bleeker 1859 Clade Actinopteri Cope 1972 s.s. Order †Elonichthyiformes Kazantseva-Selezneva 1977 Order †Phanerorhynchiformes Order †Saurichthyiformes Berg 1937 Subclass Chondrostei Order †Birgeriiformes Jin 2001 Order †Chondrosteiformes Order Acipenseriformes Berg 1940 Subclass Neopterygii Regan 1923 sensu Xu & Wu 2012 Order †Pholidopleuriformes Berg 1937 Order †Peltopleuriformes Lehman 1966 Order †Perleidiformes Berg 1937 Order †Luganoiiformes Lehman 1958 Order †Pycnodontiformes Berg 1937 Infraclass Holostei Muller 1844 Division Halecomorpha Cope 1872 sensu Grande & Bemis 1998 Order †Parasemionotiformes Lehman 1966 Order †Ionoscopiformes Grande & Bemis 1998 Order Amiiformes Huxley 1861 sensu Grande & Bemis 1998 Division Ginglymodi Cope 1871 Order †Dapediiformes Thies & Waschkewitz 2015 Order †Semionotiformes Arambourg & Bertin 1958 Order Lepisosteiformes Hay 1929 Clade Teleosteomorpha Arratia 2000 sensu Arratia 2013 Order †Prohaleciteiformes Arratia 2017 Division Aspidorhynchei Nelson, Grand & Wilson 2016 Order †Aspidorhynchiformes Bleeker 1859 Order †Pachycormiformes Berg 1937 Infraclass Teleostei Müller 1844 sensu Arratia 2013 Order †?
Araripichthyiformes Order †? Ligulelliiformes Taverne 2011 Order †? Tselfatiiformes Nelson 1994 Order †Pholidophori
Nova Scotia
Nova Scotia is one of Canada's three Maritime Provinces, one of the four provinces that form Atlantic Canada. Its provincial capital is Halifax. Nova Scotia is the second-smallest of Canada's ten provinces, with an area of 55,284 square kilometres, including Cape Breton and another 3,800 coastal islands; as of 2016, the population was 923,598. Nova Scotia is Canada's second-most-densely populated province, after Prince Edward Island, with 17.4 inhabitants per square kilometre. "Nova Scotia" means "New Scotland" in Latin and is the recognized English-language name for the province. In both French and Scottish Gaelic, the province is directly translated as "New Scotland". In general and Slavic languages use a direct translation of "New Scotland", while most other languages use direct transliterations of the Latin / English name; the province was first named in the 1621 Royal Charter granting to Sir William Alexander in 1632 the right to settle lands including modern Nova Scotia, Cape Breton Island, Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick and the Gaspé Peninsula.
Nova Scotia is Canada's smallest province in area after Prince Edward Island. The province's mainland is the Nova Scotia peninsula surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, including numerous bays and estuaries. Nowhere in Nova Scotia is more than 67 km from the ocean. Cape Breton Island, a large island to the northeast of the Nova Scotia mainland, is part of the province, as is Sable Island, a small island notorious for its shipwrecks 175 km from the province's southern coast. Nova Scotia has many ancient fossil-bearing rock formations; these formations are rich on the Bay of Fundy's shores. Blue Beach near Hantsport, Joggins Fossil Cliffs, on the Bay of Fundy's shores, has yielded an abundance of Carboniferous-age fossils. Wasson's Bluff, near the town of Parrsboro, has yielded both Triassic- and Jurassic-age fossils; the province contains 5,400 lakes. Nova Scotia lies in the mid-temperate zone and, although the province is surrounded by water, the climate is closer to continental climate rather than maritime.
The winter and summer temperature extremes of the continental climate are moderated by the ocean. However, winters are cold enough to be classified as continental—still being nearer the freezing point than inland areas to the west; the Nova Scotian climate is in many ways similar to the central Baltic Sea coast in Northern Europe, only wetter and snowier. This is true in spite of Nova Scotia's being some fifteen parallels south. Areas not on the Atlantic coast experience warmer summers more typical of inland areas, winter lows a little colder. Described on the provincial vehicle licence plate as Canada's Ocean Playground, Nova Scotia is surrounded by four major bodies of water: the Gulf of Saint Lawrence to the north, the Bay of Fundy to the west, the Gulf of Maine to the southwest, Atlantic Ocean to the east; the province includes regions of the Mi'kmaq nation of Mi'kma'ki. The Mi'kmaq people inhabited Nova Scotia at the time the first European colonists arrived. In 1605, French colonists established the first permanent European settlement in the future Canada at Port Royal, founding what would become known as Acadia.
The British conquest of Acadia took place in 1710. The Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 formally recognized this and returned Cape Breton Island to the French. Present-day New Brunswick still formed a part of the French colony of Acadia. After the capture of Port Royal in 1710, Francis Nicholson announced it would be renamed Annapolis Royal in honor of Queen Anne. In 1749, the capital of Nova Scotia moved from Annapolis Royal to the newly established Halifax. In 1755 the vast majority of the French population was forcibly removed in the Expulsion of the Acadians. In 1763, most of Acadia became part of Nova Scotia. In 1769, St. John's Island became a separate colony. Nova Scotia included present-day New Brunswick until that province's establishment in 1784, after the arrival of United Empire Loyalists. In 1867, Nova Scotia became one of the four founding provinces of the Canadian Confederation; the warfare on Nova Scotian soil during the 17th and 18th centuries influenced the history of Nova Scotia. The Mi'kmaq had lived in Nova Scotia for centuries.
The French arrived in 1604, Catholic Mi'kmaq and Acadians formed the majority of the population of the colony for the next 150 years. During the first 80 years the French and Acadians lived in Nova Scotia, nine significant military clashes took place as the English and Scottish and French fought for possession of the area; these encounters happened at Port Royal, Saint John, Cap de Sable and Baleine. The Acadian Civil War took place from 1640 to 1645. Beginning with King William's War in 1688, six wars took place in Nova Scotia before the British defeated the French and made peace with the Mi'kmaq: King William's War, Queen Anne's War, Father Rale's War, King George's War, Father Le Loutre’s War The Seven Years' War called the French and Indian War The battles during these wars took place Port Royal, Saint John, Chignecto, Dartmouth and Grand-Pré. Despite the British conquest of Acadia in 1710, Nova Scotia remained occupied
Crappie
Crappies are a genus, Pomoxis, of North American fresh water fish in the sunfish family Centrarchidae. Both species in this genus are popular pan fish; the genus name Pomoxis derives from the Greek πώμα and οξύς. The common name, derives from the Canadian French crapet, which refers to many different fishes of the sunfish family. Other names for crappie are papermouths, strawberry bass, speckled bass or specks, speckled perch, white perch, crappie bass, calico bass, sac-a-lait and Oswego bass; the recognized species in this genus are: White crappie – P. annularis Rafinesque, 1818 Black crappie – P. nigromaculatus Both species of crappie as adults feed predominantly on smaller fish species, including the young of their own predators. They have diverse diets, including zooplankton and crustaceans. By day, crappie tend to be less active and will concentrate around weed beds or submerged objects, such as logs and boulders, they feed by moving into open water or approaching the shore. The Pomoxis species are regarded pan fish and are considered to be among the best-tasting freshwater fish.
Because of their diverse diets, crappie may be caught in many ways, including casting light jigs, trolling with minnows or artificial lures, using small spinnerbaits, or using bobbers. Crappies are popular with ice-anglers, as they are active in winter; the current all-tackle fishing world record for a black crappie is 2.25 kg and for a white crappie is 2.35 kg. Angling for crappie is popular throughout much of North America. Methods vary, but among the most popular is called "spider rigging", a method characterized by a fisherman in a boat with many long fishing rods pointing away from the angler at various angles like spokes from a wheel. Anglers who employ the spider rigging method may choose from among many popular baits; some of the most popular are plastic jigs with crankbaits or live minnows. Many anglers chum or dump live bait into the water to attract the fish to bite their bait. Crappies are regularly targeted and caught during the spawning period by fly fishermen, can be taken from frozen ponds and lakes in winter by ice fishing.
Before state fisheries departments began to implement more restrictive, conservation-minded regulations, a great number of crappies in the Mississippi River states, were harvested commercially in the 19th and early 20th centuries. At one point the annual crappie catch sold at fish markets in the United States was reported to be three million pounds. A commercial fishery for crappies existed at Reelfoot Lake in Tennessee until 2003, it was one of the few commercial fisheries for crappies in recent decades. By information from International Game Fish Association IGFA the most outstanding records: Black crappie: a 2.26 kg fish caught on 21 April 2005 by John R. Horstman from a private lake in Missouri, US White crappie: a 2.35 kg fish caught on 31 July 1957 by Fred Brigh in Water Valley, Mississippi, US Ellis, Jack. The Sunfishes-A Fly Fishing Journey of Discovery. Bennington, VT: Abenaki Publishers, Inc. ISBN 0-936644-17-6. Rice, F. Philip. America's Favorite Fishing: A Complete Guide to Angling for Panfish.
New York: Harper Row. Rice, F. Philip. Panfishing. New York: Stackpole Books. ISBN 0-943822-25-4. Malo, John. Fly-Fishing for Panfish. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Dillon Press Inc. ISBN 0-87518-208-9. Nelson, Gary. Panfishing. Minneapolis, MN: North American Fishing Club. ISBN 0-914697-37-4
Lake Ontario
Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is surrounded on the north and southwest by the Canadian province of Ontario, on the south and east by the American state of New York, whose water boundaries meet in the middle of the lake. Ontario, Canada's most populous province, was named for the lake. Many of Ontario's most populous cities, including Toronto, Canada's most populous city, Hamilton, are on the lake's northern or western shores. In the Huron language, the name Ontarí'io means "Lake of Shining Waters", its primary inlet is the Niagara River from Lake Erie. The last in the Great Lakes chain, Lake Ontario serves as the outlet to the Atlantic Ocean via the Saint Lawrence River, it is the only Great Lake not to border the state of Michigan. Lake Ontario is the easternmost of the Great Lakes and the smallest in surface area, although it exceeds Lake Erie in volume, it is the 13th largest lake in the world. When its islands are included, the lake's shoreline is 712 miles long.
As the last lake in the Great Lakes' hydrologic chain, Lake Ontario has the lowest mean surface elevation of the lakes at 243 feet above sea level. Its maximum length is 193 statute miles and its maximum width is 53 statute miles; the lake's average depth is 47 fathoms 1 foot, with a maximum depth of 133 fathoms 4 feet. The lake's primary source is the Niagara River, draining Lake Erie, with the St. Lawrence River serving as the outlet; the drainage basin covers 24,720 square miles. As with all the Great Lakes, water levels change both among years; these water level fluctuations are an integral part of lake ecology, produce and maintain extensive wetlands. The lake has an important freshwater fishery, although it has been negatively affected by factors including over-fishing, water pollution and invasive species. Baymouth bars built by prevailing winds and currents have created a significant number of lagoons and sheltered harbors near Prince Edward County and the easternmost shores; the best-known example is Toronto Bay, chosen as the site of the Upper Canada capital for its strategic harbour.
Other prominent examples include Hamilton Harbour, Irondequoit Bay, Presqu'ile Bay, Sodus Bay. The bars themselves are the sites of long beaches, such as Sandbanks Provincial Park and Sandy Island Beach State Park; these sand bars are associated with large wetlands, which support large numbers of plant and animal species, as well as providing important rest areas for migratory birds. Presqu'ile, on the north shore of Lake Ontario, is significant in this regard. One unique feature of the lake is the Z-shaped Bay of Quinte which separates Prince Edward County from the Ontario mainland, save for a 2-mile isthmus near Trenton. Major rivers draining into Lake Ontario include the Niagara River, Don River, Humber River, Trent River, Cataraqui River, Genesee River, Oswego River, Black River, Little Salmon River, the Salmon River; the lake basin was carved out of soft, weak Silurian-age rocks by the Wisconsin ice sheet during the last ice age. The action of the ice occurred along the pre-glacial Ontarian River valley which had the same orientation as today's basin.
Material, pushed southward by the ice sheet left landforms such as drumlins and moraines, both on the modern land surface and the lake bottom, reorganizing the region's entire drainage system. As the ice sheet retreated toward the north, it still dammed the St. Lawrence valley outlet, so the lake surface was at a higher level; this stage is known as Lake Iroquois. During that time the lake drained through present-day Syracuse, New York into the Mohawk River, thence to the Hudson River and the Atlantic; the shoreline created during this stage can be recognized by the beaches and wave-cut hills 10 to 25 miles from the present shoreline. When the ice receded from the St. Lawrence valley, the outlet was below sea level, for a short time the lake became a bay of the Atlantic Ocean, in association with the Champlain Sea; the land rebounded from the release of the weight of about 6,500 feet of ice, stacked on it. It is still rebounding about 12 inches per century in the St. Lawrence area. Since the ice receded from the area last, the most rapid rebound still occurs there.
This means the lake bed is tilting southward, inundating the south shore and turning river valleys into bays. Both north and south shores experience shoreline erosion, but the tilting amplifies this effect on the south shore, causing loss to property owners; the name Ontario is derived from the Huron word Ontarí'io, which means "great lake". The lake was a border between the Huron people and the Iroquois Confederacy in the pre-Columbian era. In the 1600s, the Iroquois drove out the Huron from southern Ontario and settled the northern shores of Lake Ontario; when the Iroquois withdrew and the Anishnabeg / Ojibwa / Mississaugas moved in from the north to southern Ontario, they retained the Iroquois name. It is believed the first European to reach the lake was Étienne Brûlé in 1615; as was their practice, the French explorers introduced other names for the lake. In 1632 and 1656, the lake was referred to as Lac de St. Louis or Lake St. Louis by Samuel de Champlain and cartographer Nicolas Sanson In
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