Bras d'Or Lake ( Mi'kmawi'simk: Pitupaq) is an irregular

estuary An estuary is a partially enclosed coastal body of brackish water with one or more rivers or streams flowing into it, and with a free connection to the open sea. Estuaries form a transition zone between river environments and maritime environm ...

in the centre of Cape Breton Island in

Nova Scotia Nova Scotia ( ; ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. Nova Scotia is Latin for "New Scotland". Most of the population are native Eng ...

, Canada. It has a connection to the open sea, and is tidal. It also has inflows of fresh water from rivers, making the

brackish water Brackish water, sometimes termed brack water, is water occurring in a natural environment that has more salinity than freshwater, but not as much as seawater. It may result from mixing seawater (salt water) and fresh water together, as in estuari ...

a very productive natural habitat. It was designated the

Bras d'Or Lake Biosphere Reserve Bras d'Or Lake Biosphere Reserve (established 2011) is a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve located at Bras d'Or Lake, Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, Canada. It consists of a salt-water estuary watershed inland sea with three passages to the Atlantic ...

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international cooperation in education, arts, sciences and culture. It ...

in 2011.

Toponym

Pronounced ( or ), maps before 1872 name it ''Le Lac de Labrador'' (or more simply ''Labrador''). ''Labrador'' was the name given by the Portuguese to much of eastern Canada. It meant ''farmer'', and is cognate with ''laborer''. An error of folk etymology, the name is spelt to resemble the French language ''Arm of'' ''Gold'', a

homonym In linguistics, homonyms are words which are homographs (words that share the same spelling, regardless of pronunciation), or homophones ( equivocal words, that share the same pronunciation, regardless of spelling), or both. Using this definiti ...

. It is also called locally ''The Bras d'Or Lakes''. In Mi'kmawi'simk, the lake's name, ''Pitupaq'', refers to the brackish waters, meaning "the long salt water."

Geography

The lake has a surface area of 1099 square kilometers. Three

arm In human anatomy, the arm refers to the upper limb in common usage, although academically the term specifically means the upper arm between the glenohumeral joint (shoulder joint) and the elbow joint. The distal part of the upper limb between th ...

s stretch out to the north east. At the top, the Great Bras d'Or Channel connects to the ocean via a navigable channel. The maximum depth is in the

East Bay The East Bay is the eastern region of the San Francisco Bay Area and includes cities along the eastern shores of the San Francisco Bay and San Pablo Bay. The region has grown to include inland communities in Alameda and Contra Costa counties ...

. It sits in 3,500 square kilometer

drainage basin A drainage basin is an area of land where all flowing surface water converges to a single point, such as a river mouth, or flows into another body of water, such as a lake or ocean. A basin is separated from adjacent basins by a perimeter, ...

. The western side is generally shallow, and is part of an extensive

drumlin A drumlin, from the Irish word ''droimnín'' ("littlest ridge"), first recorded in 1833, in the classical sense is an elongated hill in the shape of an inverted spoon or half-buried egg formed by glacial ice acting on underlying unconsolidated ...

field. Steep hills rise abruptly on the northwestern side, to the

Cape Breton Highlands The Cape Breton Highlands (french: Plateau du Cap-Breton, gd, Àrd-thalamh Cheap Bhreatainn), commonly called the Highlands, refer to a highland or mountainous plateau across the northern part of Cape Breton Island in the Canadian province of N ...

. The Denys, Middle,

Baddeck Baddeck () is a village in northeastern Nova Scotia, Canada. It is situated in the centre of Cape Breton, approximately 6 km east of where the Baddeck River empties into Bras d'Or Lake. Local governance is provided by the rural municipality ...

, and Georges Rivers all empty into the lake. The lake water has lower salinity than the surrounding ocean, and varies from about 20 parts per thousand near river mouths to 29 parts per thousand in deeper areas. Ice cover has been declining in recent years. The lake is connected to the North Atlantic by two natural channels; the Great and Little Bras d'Or Channels which pass on either side of

Boularderie Island Boularderie Island (pronounced "bull-awn-dree") is an island separating the Cabot Strait from Bras d'Or Lake on the eastern coast of Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, Canada. It takes its name from Louis-Simon le Poupet de la Boularderie, who was g ...

. The southern tip of the lake is connected to the

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe ...

via the St. Peters Canal, built for shipping traffic in the 1860s. The restricted channels to the ocean cause a reduction in

tidal range Tidal range is the difference in height between high tide and low tide. Tides are the rise and fall of sea levels caused by gravitational forces exerted by the Moon and Sun and the rotation of Earth. Tidal range depends on time and location. ...

. Seaweed populations resemble those found in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The warm waters are suitable for

eastern oyster The eastern oyster (''Crassostrea virginica'')—also called the Atlantic oyster, American oyster, or East Coast oyster—is a species of true oyster native to eastern North and South America. Other names in local or culinary use include the We ...

. Fish species include the

blackspotted stickleback The blackspotted stickleback (''Gasterosteus wheatlandi'') is species of ray-finned fish belonging to the family Gasterosteidae, the sticklebacks. This fish is found in the western Atlantic from the coasts of Newfoundland (Canada) to Massac ...

white hake The white hake or mud hake (''Urophycis tenuis'') is a phycid hake. It is found in the deeper waters in the northwest Atlantic Ocean. Description The species can grow to be up to 30 cm by the end of the first year, and 400 mm if ma ...

blueback herring The blueback herring, blueback shad, or summer shad (''Alosa aestivalis'') is an anadromous species of herring from the east coast of North America, with a range from Nova Scotia to Florida. Blueback herring form schools and are believed to mi ...

Greenland cod The Greenland cod (''Gadus ogac''), commonly known also as ogac, is a species of ray-finned fish in the cod family, Gadidae. Genetic analysis has shown that it may be the same species as the Pacific cod (''Gadus macrocephalus''). It is a bottom-dw ...

, and introduced rainbow trout. These feed

double-crested cormorant The double-crested cormorant (''Nannopterum auritum'') is a member of the cormorant family of water birds. It is found near rivers and lakes, and in coastal areas, and is widely distributed across North America, from the Aleutian Islands in Al ...

s, bald eagles, and great blue herons.

Human history

Mi'kmaq The Mi'kmaq (also ''Mi'gmaq'', ''Lnu'', ''Miꞌkmaw'' or ''Miꞌgmaw''; ; ) are a First Nations people of the Northeastern Woodlands, indigenous to the areas of Canada's Atlantic Provinces and the Gaspé Peninsula of Quebec as well as the nort ...

peoples have lived in the area for the last 4,000 years. Named Unama'ki in their language, it is the fire (or capital district) of their country, Mi'kma'ki, part of the greater

Wabanaki Confederacy The Wabanaki Confederacy (''Wabenaki, Wobanaki'', translated to "People of the Dawn" or "Easterner") is a North American First Nations and Native American confederation of four principal Eastern Algonquian nations: the Miꞌkmaq, Maliseet ( ...

of the Dawnland region. The Mi'kmaq call the lake ''Pitupaq'', meaning ''long salt water''. A French trading post was built in 1650. Alexander Graham Bell built an estate

Beinn Bhreagh ( ) is the name of the former estate of Alexander Graham Bell, in Victoria County, Nova Scotia. It refers to a peninsula jutting into Cape Breton Island's scenic Bras d'Or Lake approximately southeast of the village of Baddeck, forming th ...

where he established a research laboratory, and used the lake to test man-carrying

kite A kite is a tethered heavier-than-air or lighter-than-air craft with wing surfaces that react against the air to create lift and drag forces. A kite consists of wings, tethers and anchors. Kites often have a bridle and tail to guide the fac ...

s, airplanes and hydrofoil boats. Most of the shore is undeveloped, but settlements include

, Eskasoni,

Little Bras d'Or Little Bras d'Or is a community in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia, located in the Cape Breton Regional Municipality on Cape Breton County on Cape Breton Island. Demographics In the 2021 Census of Population The 2021 Canadian cen ...

, St. Peter's, and Whycocomagh. Shoreline is under the jurisdiction of the

Cape Breton Regional Municipality Cape Breton Regional Municipality (often referred to as simply "CBRM") is the Canadian province of Nova Scotia's second largest municipality and the economic heart of Cape Breton Island. As of 2016 the municipality has a population of 94,285. The ...

and the county municipalities of Inverness,

Victoria Victoria most commonly refers to: * Victoria (Australia), a state of the Commonwealth of Australia * Victoria, British Columbia, provincial capital of British Columbia, Canada * Victoria (mythology), Roman goddess of Victory * Victoria, Seychelle ...

, and

Richmond Richmond most often refers to: * Richmond, Virginia, the capital of Virginia, United States * Richmond, London, a part of London * Richmond, North Yorkshire, a town in England * Richmond, British Columbia, a city in Canada * Richmond, California, ...

. Sailboat racing is a long tradition in the Bras d'Or, with events hosted by the

Bras d'Or Yacht Club The Bras d'Or Yacht Club is a yacht club in Baddeck, Nova Scotia. It is located on its namesake body of water, the Bras d'Or Lakes. The club was founded in 1904. Among its founding members were Gilbert Hovey Grosvenor, H. Percy Blanchard and A ...

Today most economic activity around the lake is related to the services in the

tertiary sector of the economy The tertiary sector of the economy, generally known as the service sector, is the third of the three economic sectors in the three-sector model (also known as the economic cycle). The others are the primary sector ( raw materials) and the seco ...

Gallery

Bras d'Or Lakes.jpg, Marble Mountain in early summer Great Bras d'Or (Seal Island) Bridge (cropped).jpg, Ocean-going ships enter and exit the Bras d'Or Lake system via Great Bras d'Or, spanned by the

Seal Island Bridge The Seal Island Bridge is a bridge located in Victoria County, Nova Scotia. It is the third longest bridge span in the province. The bridge is a through arch design and crosses the Great Bras d'Or channel of Bras d'Or Lake, connecting Bou ...

ISteameronBrasDorLakeNearNewCampbelltonCa1900.jpg, Passenger steamer on Bras d'Or Lake near New Campbellton, ca 1903. 20090726 East Bay Regatta 0088.jpg, The East Bay Regatta, held the last weekend in July since 1984, features races and other social events. As many as 40 boats participate.

References

External links