Fundy National Park
Proclaimed in 1948, this national park, located on the southeastern coast between St. John and Moncton in the Canadian Province of New Brunswick, covers 206 sq km (80 sq mi). The tidal fluctuation of the Bay of Fundy, which it borders, is the highest in the world.
There are bogs, which are wet, poorly drained areas, one of which is located along the Caribou Plain trail. Black spruce and larch grow in a thick sphagnum moss carpet.
Some of these stunted trees have lived here for more than a century, yet are no taller than a person. Their growth is limited by a lack of nutrients in naturally acidic soil. The bog pond is too acidic for most frog and fish eggs to hatch.
Back of the beaches, where the Fundy tides can be experienced, are steep cliffs which are being sculpted by the daily movements of Fundy’s giant tides. The water has exposed the bedrock for most of the coastline of the park.
However, most of the park is made up of rolling and rounded mountains which form the Caledonian Highlands. For millenia, the rivers have been carrying away tonnes of rocks and sand which were dumped into the valleys by the retreating glaciers of the last Ice Age.
Humans left little evidence of their passing in what is now Fundy National Park until European settlement began in this area about 1825. Rocky, acidic soils combined with cool summers and harsh winters were not conducive to prosperous homesteading.
See summer map and winter map of the park.
We would like to thank the staffs at Fundy National Park and Parks Canada for providing information for this page.
See also: National Parks of Canada.
(This page was updated November 2012.)
