Great Lakes

The Great Lakes have been central to the development of eastern North America. In this “beautifully designed, comprehensive gem of a guide to the ecosystem at the heart of Canada” (The Tyee), award-winning science and nature writer Wayne Grady makes scientific concepts accessible as he reveals how human impact has changed this life-giving region. The Great Lakes: A Natural History of a Changing Region is the most authoritative, complete and accessible book to date about the biology and ecology of this vital, ever-changing terrain. Written by one of Canada's best-known science and nature writers, it is intended not only for those who live in the Great Lakes region, but for anyone captivated by the splendor of the natural world and sensitive to the challenges of its preservation. It is both a first-hand tribute and an essential guide to a fascinating ecosystem in eternal flux.

North America's Great Lakes country has experienced centuries of upheaval. Its landscapes are utterly changed from what they were five hundred years ago. The region's superabundant fish and wildlife and its magnificent forests and prairies astonished European newcomers who called it an earthly paradise but then ushered in an era of disease, warfare, resource depletion, and land development that transformed it forever. The Once and Future Great Lakes Country is a history of environmental change in the Great Lakes region, looking as far back as the last ice age, and also reflecting on modern trajectories of change, many of them positive. John Riley chronicles how the region serves as a continental crossroads, one that experienced massive declines in its wildlife and native plants in the centuries after European contact, and has begun to see increased nature protection and re-wilding in recent decades. Yet climate change, globalization, invasive species, and urban sprawl are today exerting new pressures on the region’s ecology. Covering a vast geography encompassing two Canadian provinces and nine American states, The Once and Future Great Lakes Country provides both a detailed ecological history and a broad panorama of this vast region. It blends the voices of early visitors with the hopes of citizens now.

Napier Shelton takes us on a journey as he spends a year at his family's cottage on the lake. Having visited Lake Huron for over thirty years, Shelton weaves family memories into his evocative and informed account of the seasons on this great lake. In 1995, Shelton spent a year at the cottage more fully exploring Lake Huron and its varied shores. He writes about Native American fishing rights, small towns, the fearsome ice, and the migration of birds. He follows the seasonal changes of life in the water. We accompany him on commercial fishing boats, a research vessel studying lake trout, and a Coast Guard icebreaker. We experience the travels and tragedies of venturers on Lake Huron over the past four centuries. Huron is pleasurable reading for any student of natural history or the Great Lakes region, or for anyone who has ever spent time at a summer cottage or wished to do so.

The Great Lakes provides a clear and concise introduction to the formation of the Great Lakes and the physical process that control fluctuations in lake levels. Shore erosion and sedimentation are discussed and certain aspects of pollution are explained. Excellent maps, diagrams, and photographs accompany the text.