Travel north from Toronto toward Moosonee (the last stretch is by train, as no road reaches it) and the living landscape changes like chapters in a book. Maples, oaks and farm fields give way to pine and spruce on bare pink rock, then to endless spruce and lakes, then to flat, soggy peatland with stunted trees and polar bears on the coast. The changes are not random. Each landscape is a package in which climate, rock, soil, plants and animals depend on each other. Geographers call these packages ecozones.
What is an ecozone?
An ecozone is a very large area of land (or sea) where climate, landforms, soils, water, vegetation, wildlife and human activity combine in a recognizable pattern. Canada's national framework divides the land into 15 terrestrial ecozones, each split into smaller ecoregions and then ecodistricts. Ecozones are a good example of the geographic thinking concept of interrelationships: change one part, such as the climate, and the soils, plants and animals all change with it.
| Ecozone | Climate | Natural vegetation | Soil | Wildlife and people |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Arctic ecozones (Northern and Southern Arctic, Arctic Cordillera) | Very cold, long winters, short cool summers, little precipitation | Tundra: mosses, lichens, sedges, dwarf shrubs; no trees | Thin, frozen soils over permafrost | Caribou, muskox, Arctic fox, polar bear; Inuit communities, hunting, mining |
| Taiga (Plains, Shield, Cordillera) | Long, cold winters, short summers | Open, stunted forest of black spruce, larch and lichen | Thin, wet, often frozen | Caribou, wolves; First Nations and Métis communities, mining |
| Boreal Shield | Cold winters, warm summers, moderate precipitation | Boreal forest: spruce, fir, jack pine, birch, poplar | Thin, acidic podzols on Shield rock | Moose, black bear, loons; forestry, mining, hydro, cottages |
| Prairies | Continental: hot summers, cold winters, dry | Grassland (most now farmed) | Deep, fertile black and brown chernozems | Pronghorn, ground squirrels; grain, canola, cattle, oil and gas |
| Mixedwood Plains | Warmest in central Canada, humid, long growing season | Mixed and deciduous forest: maple, oak, beech, pine (much cleared) | Fertile grey-brown forest soils | White-tailed deer; farms, most of Canada's cities |
| Pacific Maritime | Mild, very wet maritime climate | Temperate rainforest: western red cedar, Douglas fir, Sitka spruce | Deep, moist forest soils | Salmon, black bear, orca offshore; forestry, fishing, Vancouver |
| Montane Cordillera | Varies with elevation; dry valleys, snowy peaks | Forest on slopes, alpine meadows high up, grassland in rain shadow valleys | Varied; thin on steep slopes | Mountain goat, bighorn sheep, grizzly; tourism, ranching, orchards |
Natural vegetation regions
- Tundra: north of the treeline, where summers are too short and cold for trees; low mosses, lichens, grasses and flowering plants.
- Boreal forest: Canada's largest forest, a band of coniferous trees (spruce, fir, pine) with birch and poplar, from Yukon to Newfoundland and Labrador.
- Mixed forest: a blend of conifers and broad-leaved trees, such as across central Ontario and the Maritimes.
- Deciduous (Carolinian) forest: broad-leaved trees that drop their leaves, in one of Canada's warmest corners, along Lake Erie.
- Grassland: the natural Prairie, too dry for most trees; deep roots of grasses build thick soil.
- Temperate rainforest: giant evergreens on the wet BC coast.
- Montane and alpine: vegetation that changes in bands as you climb a mountain, much like travelling north.
Soils: the link between rock, climate and plants
| Soil | Where | Why it forms that way |
|---|---|---|
| Chernozem (black soil) | Prairies | Grass roots die and decay every year, adding thick dark humus; low rainfall means few nutrients are washed away. Canada's best farm soil. |
| Podzol | Boreal forest | Needles make the soil acidic; rain and snowmelt wash (leach) nutrients downward, leaving a grey, infertile upper layer. |
| Grey-brown forest soil (luvisol) | Southern Ontario's Mixedwood Plains | Leaves from broad-leaved trees add nutrients; a warm, moist climate and glacial deposits make fertile farmland. |
| Cryosol | Arctic and northern taiga | Permafrost below keeps the soil cold and waterlogged; little decay, so it is thin and poor. |
Ontario's three ecozones
- Mixedwood Plains (south): Canada's most heavily populated and most altered ecozone; most of the original forest and wetland was cleared for farms and cities. Its southern tip, the Carolinian zone along Lake Erie, covers well under 1 percent of Canada's land (about a quarter of one percent) yet is one of the most species-rich places in the country, home to many species at risk.
- Boreal Shield (middle): boreal and mixed forest on Canadian Shield rock, thousands of lakes; forestry, mining, tourism and many First Nations communities.
- Hudson Plains (far north): the Hudson Bay Lowlands' flat peatlands, one of the largest wetlands on Earth, storing huge amounts of carbon; permafrost near the coast; polar bears, caribou and millions of migrating birds.
People change ecozones too. Farming replaced almost all of the natural tall-grass prairie and most of southern Ontario's forest. Cities, roads and dams break up habitat, and invasive species such as the emerald ash borer have killed millions of ash trees. On the other hand, parks, conservation areas and Indigenous-led protected areas keep large parts of ecozones intact. Understanding how an ecozone works helps communities decide where to farm, log, build or protect.