Caribou Island is an uninhabited island in

Lake Superior Lake Superior in central North America is the largest freshwater lake in the world by surface areaThe Caspian Sea is the largest lake, but is saline, not freshwater. and the third-largest by volume, holding 10% of the world's surface fresh wa ...

, approximately south of the

township A township is a kind of human settlement or administrative subdivision, with its meaning varying in different countries. Although the term is occasionally associated with an urban area, that tends to be an exception to the rule. In Australia, Ca ...

Shuniah Shuniah () is a municipal township bordering the city of Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada on the east. Shuniah was incorporated by an act of the Ontario legislature in 1873, and at that time included much of present-day Thunder Bay and its predecesso ...

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...

and approximately east of the city of

Thunder Bay Thunder Bay is a city in and the seat of Thunder Bay District, Ontario, Canada. It is the most populous municipality in Northwestern Ontario and the second most populous (after Greater Sudbury) municipality in Northern Ontario; its population ...

. It is approximately long and wide, and in area. The north shore of the island features steep cliffs leading to an elevated

plateau In geology and physical geography, a plateau (; ; ), also called a high plain or a tableland, is an area of a highland consisting of flat terrain that is raised sharply above the surrounding area on at least one side. Often one or more sides ha ...

. Atop the plateau lies a small

kettle lake A kettle (also known as a kettle lake, kettle hole, or pothole) is a depression/hole in an outwash plain formed by retreating glaciers or draining floodwaters. The kettles are formed as a result of blocks of dead ice left behind by retreating gla ...

. The island is prominently visible from several points around

, including notably from

Sleeping Giant Provincial Park Sleeping Giant Provincial Park, established in 1944 as Sibley Provincial Park and renamed in 1988, is a park located on the Sibley Peninsula in Northwestern Ontario, east of Thunder Bay. The nearest communities are Pass Lake, in the township o ...

's Caribou Island lookout. The island and its cliffs were featured in

Andrew Cividino Andrew Cividino (born 1983) is a Canadian film director and screenwriter."Big buzz at Cannes for Canadian auteur's coming-of-age yarn". ''Montreal Gazette'', May 22, 2015. He is best known for his feature film directorial debut '' Sleeping Giant' ...

's 2015 coming-of-age drama Sleeping Giant.

Conservation

The island is described as having a high level of ecological value serving as home to a mature forest and endangered species. While

white tail deer The white-tailed deer (''Odocoileus virginianus''), also known as the whitetail or Virginia deer, is a medium-sized deer native to North America, Central America, and South America as far south as Peru and Bolivia. It has also been introduced t ...

have been known to inhabit the island, despite its name, the island is not known to be inhabited by any

caribou Reindeer (in North American English, known as caribou if wild and ''reindeer'' if domesticated) are deer in the genus ''Rangifer''. For the last few decades, reindeer were assigned to one species, ''Rangifer tarandus'', with about 10 subspe ...

. In 2014 the

Nature Conservancy of Canada The Nature Conservancy of Canada (NCC) is a private, non-profit, charitable nature conservation and restoration organization based in Canada. Since its founding in 1962, the organization and its partners have protected of land and water across ...

purchased of the island along its southern shore for the purposes of

nature conservation Nature conservation is the moral philosophy and conservation movement focused on protecting species from extinction, maintaining and restoring habitats, enhancing ecosystem services, and protecting biological diversity. A range of values unde ...

. The island contains some hiking trails and, like other Nature Conservancy of Canada properties, is open to the public.

References

{{reflist Uninhabited islands of Ontario Islands of Lake Superior in Ontario Lake Superior