Great Lakes
The Great Lakes ( Great Lakes english ) are a group of five contiguous freshwater lakes in North America.
Geography
One of the major lakes include:
- Lake Erie ( Lake Erie )
- Lake Huron ( Lake Huron )
- Lake Michigan ( Lake Michigan)
- Lake Superior ( Lake Superior)
- Lake Ontario ( Lake Ontario)
Seen Hydrological form Huron and Lake Michigan along only a lake with a narrow point, the Mackinacstraße. The maximum height difference between the lakes is about 150 meters, the largest part of it form the Niagara Falls between the Erie and Lake Ontario. Due to their size the tide is on the Great Lakes noticeable, but the effects are small and are covered by meteorological effects. Lake Michigan is the only Great Lakes entirely in the USA, the other four are located along the Canada -US border. By the St. Lawrence River, they are drained into the Atlantic.
More than 35,000 inland islands or inland island groups are located in the Great Lakes region. In the Canadian portion of the Lake Huron is for example Manitoulin Iceland, with 2,766 square kilometers in area largest lake island in the world.
In the winter, produces the water surface of the Great Lakes of Lake effect snow. The resulting Snow Belt extends across five states.
Geology
The area surrounding the Great Lakes and the lowlands of the St. Lawrence River and its still widely in the shelf under the sea, continuing estuary provide a geologic unit dar.
Glacial removal, Auflagerung of moraine and crustal movements determine the shape of the lake area, the hollow forms, however, were already created by large-scale tectonic trough configurations in the Tertiary and early Pleistocene.
A powerful Paleozoic layer sequence, which consists of various resistant sandstones and limestones Onondaga Formation, lakes framed in the south. Between Ontario and Lake Erie and north of Lake Michigan, the existing of hard dolomite rock and soft shale Niagara Escarpment extends. On the northern edge of the Great Lakes of the Canadian Shield rises to the surface.
Comparison of the lakes
Share Canada 29,847 km ²
Share Canada 36,351 km ²
Proportion of Canada 00- 000km ²
Share Canada 12,722 km ²
Share Canada 9969 km ²
Economy and infrastructure
The Great Lakes are an important reservoir for the water supply of the United States and Canada. With about 245,000 square kilometers, they form the largest fresh surface of the earth, the Lake Baikal due to its great depth, the Great Lakes in the freshwater volume, however, still exceeds.
However, due to the strong colonization and industrialization of the area, there was a higher and higher pollution levels and for proliferation of entrained animal and plant species such as the sea lamprey, the black mouth goby and the zebra mussel. A water protection agreement was agreed in 1978 by the United States and Canada.
About the Illinois Waterway is a shipping route to the Mississippi River, via the St. Lawrence Seaway to the St. Lawrence River and thus the Atlantic Ocean. Because of the special conditions on the lakes own variety bulk carrier has been formed, the Great Lakes ship.