Breaking Water with Lake Superior
Swim Drink Fish is highlighting members of our incredible ecosystem. This Breaking Water segment features none other than Lake Superior itself. Taking Twitter by storm, we didn’t want to miss the opportunity to do a Q&A with the largest, deepest, and sassiest of the Great Lakes.
Hi, Lake Superior, is that how you'd like to be referred to?
Formally, I go by the name Gichigami, given to me by the Ojibwe people. You're welcome to call me this as well, but I usually go by Lake Superior in less formal situations, this is to respect my Indigenous name as I tend to get a little sassy at times and want to uphold that name with the highest amount of honour.
Who is Lake Superior and what makes her so special?
In short, I am the Great Lake of All Time. (All-time? Alltime? I never really know, I didn't do well in my English classes. Est-ce que tu parles français?)
Anywho... Shakespeare famously wrote, “Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon 'em.” My four siblings and I were all born Great, but only I have achieved all three.
From 30-foot waves to glassy calm mornings you can skip a stone across, I am special for my varying and unpredictable personality, my depths, and absolutely immense size. From rocky cliffs to sandy beaches, three quadrillion gallons of water, and an attitude like no other, I am simply unmatched.
Tell us what makes Lake Superior the "self-proclaimed" Greatest Lake Of All Time (G.L.O.A.T.).
I would ask that you remove "self-proclaimed" from the question.
To begin, not only would my volume fill all of the other Great Lakes (plus a couple extra Eries), they're literally filled with my old water. Not only late, but my water alone could cover the entirety of North and South America in a foot of water. By surface area, I'm the largest freshwater lake in the world. I once read it would take a single Zamboni machine 700 years to resurface the entirety of my frozen surface.
In the words of Muhammad Ali, "It's hard to be humble when you're as Great as I am."
Which Great Lake do you feel most intimidated by? Explain your ongoing disdain for Lake Erie.
To say I'm intimidated by any of my siblings is laughable. Like, really, really laughable. But they shore do annoy the agates out of me. Let's take Lake Michigan for example, all the time I hear people say it's the best Great Lake, which isn't even possible. All the time I hear people getting confused between their favourite Great Lake and the best Great Lake. Let's not confuse the two, one is based in fact (me), one is based on opinion. And it's only because of all those city people down there.
Erie? Uff da. Where do we begin? I just wish she would listen. Quit blooming! Quit acting so shallow! Quit catching on fire! Okay, I think she learned that one, I hope. She's just immature. Sure, the fishing is good, but that's so easy for such a warm body of water where the water hardly gets deeper than 200 feet.
Still waiting on that $20 (CAD) Huron owes me for the gift we sent Ontario for the holidays.
How do platforms such as Lake Superior’s Twitter account work to increase awareness when it comes to protecting our Great Lakes?
Now that's a Great question! Sure, I'm a little sassy. Do I have a Superiority complex? Yeah, but wouldn't you, if you were me?
Humour, snark, silly puns, the humans of the world really enjoy it. I love that this has given me a tremendous platform to share the message of Great Lakes science, conservation across my watershed, the beauty I possess, and to create a message of the importance of clean and healthy water for all. Some of my proudest moments aren't my viral tweets, but when a Great Lakes scientist DMs me and says that my retweet was the most love their tweets have ever received. I love to elevate their research.
Do you have anything else that you’d like to share about your watershed, your connection to water, or how we can encourage people to join the movement for a swimmable, drinkable, fishable future?
By celebrating my beauty (okay, fine, my siblings too), I hope we can create an awareness of how special we are, how great we are. In the end, lakes can't vote, fish can't clean up oil spills, and eagles can't pick up beach trash. The responsibility is fully on humans to look after myself and my siblings, to keep us fresh, to keep us cold, to keep us clean, to keep us Great.
You don't have to be a limnologist or water safety expert to help. TLC once said, "Please stick [up for] to the rivers and the lakes that you're used to." I need humans who will speak up for me and pick up after themselves. That's something everyone can start doing today.
Anything else you'd like to share?
I'm nothing short of an ambitious lake, and I am already working on my 2023 goals. I have begun a Patreon account to support more Superior content because even lakes have data plans to pay for. The ultimate goal, for now, is to attend the 66th Annual Conference on Great Lakes Research, followed by a "Tweet Around The Lake" visiting all of my communities in a 2,100 km photographic journey around my shoreline. People can learn more at www.patreon.com/lakesuperior.
As always, stay hydrated my friends.
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