......In Micmac lore, it was a giant whale, who angered the god Glooscap and created such a splash with his mighty tail, that the water sloshes back and forth to this day.
......In actuality, the story of the tremendous Bay of Fundy tides is no less the stuff of legends.
......Some 350 million years ago, it was not Glooscap, but rather the sun and moon who conspired to create this awe-inspiring natural phenomenon. That is, some 100 million years before the first dinosaurs roamed the earth, this pulsing arm of the North Atlantic was formed, its unique shape amplifying the tides to staggering proportions.
......New Brunswick's Bay of Fundy is an eco-attraction on par with such marvels as the Great Barrier Reef of Australia and the Rain Forest of Brazil. It's mighty tides are the greatest on earth. Every day, twice daily, one hundred billion tons of seawater roll in and out of the Bay. At low tide, you can literally walk on the ocean floor. At high tide, just six hours later, your footprints will be covered by the ocean. In some places, the vertical difference between high and low tide is 14 meters- roughly the same height as a four storey building!
......Fundy's onslaught of water every 12 hours and 30 minutes is estimated to nearly equal the 24 hour flow of all the rivers in the world! How nutrient-rich are Fundy's waters? In just two weeks, sandpipers feeding on Fundy shores will double their weight! Bon appetit!! For many people , the only whales they ever see are in the movies, or in large tanks in aquariums. Come to New Brunswick and see them up close, in their natural habitat! The rich feeding grounds around the Fundy Isles in southwestern New Brunswick make the Bay of Fundy one of the world's most accessible sites for viewing marine mammals. Every summer whales of all sizes ( up to 15 species of toothed and baleen whales) come to the Bay of Fundy, one of the marine wonders of the world, to mate, play and feast on the bountiful supply of food churned up twice a day by the powerful tides. The stirring of deep nutrient-rich water into shallow surface water causes immense blooms of plankton - passively floating food that nourishes all marine life. That's more kinds of whales more often than anywhere else!