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Talk:Gaius Julius Vindex

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The American window cleaner mentioned in the first silly post and in the first corrected one is spelled Windex, not Vindex.
 * (Note however that the classical pronunciation of "Vindex" would sound quite a bit like the English "Windex", roughly ['w I ndεks].)

--- Define "Classical Latin". In the late first century AD and early 2nd (Pliny 9.19 and Tacitus) did they use the classical pronunciation? Even if they did, the article can do without this silliness. And we don't use Windex any more, we use Cif, which is a whole other joke!

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Talk:Gaius Julius Vindex


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Francesco Foscari

Francesco Foscari (19 June 1373 – 1 November 1457) was the 65th Doge of the Republic of Venice from 1423 to 1457. His reign, the longest of all Doges in Venetian history, lasted 34 years, 6 months and 8 days, and coincided with the inception of the Italian Renaissance.

Biography
Francesco Foscari was born in 1373, as the oldest son of Nicolò Foscari and his wife Cateruzia Michiel. The Foscari family had been of only moderate importance, but had managed to become one of the few noble families that secured a hereditary place in the Great Council of Venice after the so-called Serrata ("Closing") of the Great Council, and had begun to rise in prominence throughout the 14th century. Francesco's ancestors began holding high public office, and his father Nicolò even became a member of the powerful Council of Ten.

Francesco served the Republic of Venice in numerous official capacities—as ambassador, president of the Council of Forty, member of the Council of Ten, inquisitor, Procurator of St Mark's, avogador de comùn— before he was elected in 1423 defeating the other candidate, Pietro Loredan. His task as doge was to lead Venice in a long and protracted series of wars against Milan, governed by the Visconti, who were attempting to dominate all of northern Italy. Despite the justification of Venetian embroilment in the terraferma that was offered in Foscari's funeral oration, delivered by the humanist senator and historian Bernardo Giustiniani, and some victories, the war was extremely costly to Venice, whose real source of wealth and power was at sea. Venice, which during Foscari's leadership abandoned her ally Florence, was eventually overcome by the forces of Milan under the leadership of Francesco Sforza. Sforza soon made peace with Florence, however, leaving Venice alone.

Foscari was married twice: first to Maria Priuli, and then in 1415 to Marina Nani. In 1445, his only surviving son, Jacopo, was tried by the Council of Ten on charges of bribery and corruption and exiled from the city. Two further trials, in 1450 and 1456 – during the latter he confessed, without even the need of torture, to having pleaded for help from the Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II and the aforementioned Duke of Milan, both Venice's enemies – led to Jacopo's imprisonment on Crete and his eventual death there soon after.

News of Jacopo's death caused Foscari to withdraw from his government duties, and in October 1457 the Council of Ten forced him to abdicate. However, his death a week later provoked such public outcry that he was given a state funeral.

Beside his profile portrait by Lazzaro Bastiani, Foscari commissioned a bas-relief bronze plaquette from Donatello, which survives in several examples. His figure kneeling in prayer to St Mark figured over the portal to the Doge's Palace until it was dismantled by order of the revolutionary government, 1797; the head was preserved and is conserved in the Museo dell'Opera di Palazzo Ducale. His monument by the sculptor Antonio Bregno in collaboration with his architect brother Paolo was erected in the church of Santa Maria dei Frari in Venice. He was deposed from office on 27 October 1457 and died five days after.

In literature and opera
Foscari's life was the subject of a play The Two Foscari by Lord Byron (1821) and an episode in Samuel Rogers' long poem Italy. The Byron play served as the basis for the libretto written by Francesco Maria Piave for Giuseppe Verdi's opera I due Foscari, which premiered on 3 November 1844 in Rome. Mary Mitford, author of the popular literary sketches of the English countryside entitled Our Village, also wrote a successful play concerned with events in Foscari's life. Mitford's play Foscari debuted at Covent Garden in 1826 with famed actor Charles Kemble in the lead.

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User talk:Fuzzynerd

Hello there, welcome to the 'pedia! I hope you like the place and decide to stay. If you need any questions answered about the project then check out Help or drop me a line. Cheers! --maveric149

Nomination of Queer literary interpretation for deletion
A discussion is taking place as to whether the article Queer literary interpretation is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Articles for deletion/Queer literary interpretation until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article. Mr. Guye (talk) 22:47, 20 May 2014 (UTC)

title: User talk:Fuzzynerd


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Battle of the Crater

The Battle of the Crater took place during the American Civil War, part of the Siege of Petersburg. It occurred on Saturday, July 30, 1864, between the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia, commanded by General Robert E. Lee, and the Union Army of the Potomac, commanded by Major General George G. Meade (under the direct supervision of the general-in-chief, Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant).

After weeks of preparation, on July 30 Union forces exploded a mine across from Union Major General Ambrose E. Burnside's IX Corps sector, blowing a gap in the Confederate defenses of Petersburg, Virginia. Instead of being a decisive advantage to the Union, this precipitated a rapid deterioration in the Union position. Unit after unit charged into and around the crater, where most of the soldiers milled in confusion in the bottom of the crater. Grant considered this failed assault as "the saddest affair I have witnessed in this war."

The Confederates quickly recovered, and launched several counterattacks led by Brigadier General William Mahone. The breach was sealed off, and the Union forces were repulsed with severe casualties, while Brigadier General Edward Ferrero's division of black soldiers was badly mauled. It may have been Grant's best chance to end the siege of Petersburg; instead, the soldiers settled in for another eight months of trench warfare.

Burnside was relieved of command for his role in the fiasco, and he was never returned to command, while Ferrero and General James H. Ledlie were observed behind the lines in a bunker, drinking liquor throughout the battle: Ledlie was criticized by a court of inquiry into his conduct that September, and in December he was effectively dismissed from the Army by Meade on orders from Grant, formally resigning his commission on January 23, 1865.

Background
During the Civil War, Petersburg, Virginia, was an important railhead, where four railroad lines from the south met before they continued to Richmond, Virginia, the capital of the Confederacy. Most supplies to General Lee's army and Richmond funneled through that location. Consequently, the Union regarded it as the "back door" to Richmond and as necessary for its defense. The result was the siege of Petersburg. It was actually trench warfare, rather than a true siege, as the armies were aligned along a series of fortified positions and trenches more than 20 mi long, extending from the old Cold Harbor battlefield near Richmond to areas south of Petersburg.

After Lee stopped Grant's attempt to seize Petersburg on June 15, the battle settled into a stalemate. Grant had learned a hard lesson at Cold Harbor about attacking Lee in a fortified position and was chafing at the inactivity to which Lee's trenches and forts had confined him. Finally, Lt. Col. Henry Pleasants, commanding the 48th Pennsylvania Infantry of Major General Ambrose E. Burnside's IX Corps, offered a novel proposal to break the impasse.

Pleasants, a mining engineer from Pennsylvania in civilian life, proposed digging a long mine shaft under the Confederate Army lines and planting explosive charges directly underneath a fort (Elliott's Salient) in the middle of the Confederate First Corps line. If successful, not only would all the defenders in the area be killed, but also a hole in the Confederate defenses would be opened. If enough Union troops filled the breach quickly enough and drove into the Confederate rear area, the Confederates would not be able to muster enough force to drive them out, and Petersburg might fall. Burnside, whose reputation had suffered from his 1862 defeat at the Battle of Fredericksburg and his poor performance earlier that year at the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House, agreed to Pleasants's plan.

Mine construction
Digging began in late June, but even Grant and Meade saw the operation as a "mere way to keep the men occupied" and doubted it of any actual tactical value. They quickly lost interest, and Pleasants soon found himself with few materials for his project, and his men even had to forage for wood to support the structure.

Work progressed steadily, however. Earth was removed by hand and packed into improvised sledges made from cracker boxes fitted with handles, and the floor, wall, and ceiling of the mine were shored up with timbers from an abandoned wood mill and even from tearing down an old bridge.

The shaft was elevated as it moved toward the Confederate lines to make sure moisture did not clog up the mine, and fresh air was drawn in by an ingenious air-exchange mechanism near the entrance. A canvas partition isolated the miners' air supply from outside air and allowed miners to enter and exit the work area easily. The miners had constructed a vertical exhaust shaft located well behind Union lines. At the vertical shaft's base, a fire was kept continuously burning. A wooden duct ran the entire length of the tunnel and protruded into the outside air. The fire heated stale air inside of the tunnel, drawing it up the exhaust shaft and out of the mine by the chimney effect. The resulting vacuum then sucked fresh air in from the mine entrance via the wooden duct, which carried it down the length of the tunnel to the place in which the miners were working. That avoided the need for additional ventilation shafts, which could have been observed by the enemy, and it also easily disguised the diggers' progress.

On July 17, the main shaft reached under the Confederate position. Rumors of a mine construction soon reached the Confederates, but Lee refused to believe or act upon them for two weeks before he commenced countermining attempts, which were sluggish and uncoordinated, and were unable to discover the mine. However, General John Pegram, whose batteries would be above the explosion, took the threat seriously enough to build a new line of trenches and artillery points behind his position as a precaution. Shafts were also sunk by the Confederates in an effort to intercept the passage. Pleasants became aware of the Confederate's counter-movements and was able to frustrate their effort by changing the direction of the main and lateral galleries while increasing their depth below the surface.

The mine was in a "T"-shape. The approach shaft was 511 ft long, starting in a sunken area downhill and more than 50 ft below the Confederate battery, making detection difficult. The tunnel entrance was narrow, about 3 ft wide and 4.5 ft high. At its end, a perpendicular gallery of 75 ft extended in both directions. Grant and Meade suddenly decided to use the mine three days after it was completed after a failed attack known later as the First Battle of Deep Bottom. Union soldiers filled the mine with 320 kegs of gunpowder, totaling 8,000 lb. The explosives were approximately 20 ft under the Confederate works, and the T-gap was packed shut with 11 ft of earth in the side galleries. A further 32 ft of packed earth was placed in the main gallery to prevent the explosion blasting out the mouth of the mine. On July 28, the powder charges were armed.

Preparation
Burnside had trained a division of United States Colored Troops (USCT) under Brigadier General Edward Ferrero to lead the assault. The division consisted of two brigades, one designated to go to the left of the crater and the other to the right. A regiment from both brigades was to leave the attack column and extend the breach by rushing perpendicular to the crater, and the remaining regiments were to rush through, seizing the Jerusalem Plank Road just 1600 ft beyond, followed by the churchyard and, if possible, Petersburg itself. Burnside's two other divisions, made up of white troops, would then move in, supporting Ferrero's flanks and race for Petersburg itself. Two miles (3 km) behind the front lines, out of sight of the Confederates, the men of the USCT division were trained for two weeks on the plan.

Despite the careful planning and intensive training, on the day before the attack, Meade, who lacked confidence in the operation, ordered Burnside not to use the black troops in the lead assault. He claimed that if the attack failed, black soldiers would be killed needlessly, creating political repercussions in the North. Meade may have also ordered the change of plans because he lacked confidence in the black soldiers' abilities in combat and feared that if they were butchered, Radical Republicans would make an issue out of it and claim they were deliberately allowed to be killed. Burnside protested to Grant, who sided with Meade. When volunteers were not forthcoming, Burnside selected a replacement white division by having the three commanders draw lots. Brigadier General James H. Ledlie's 1st Division was selected, but he failed to brief the men on what was expected of them and was reported during the battle to be drunk, well behind the lines, and not providing leadership. Ledlie would be dismissed for his actions during the battle. Ledlie, a civilian soldier with no proper military training, also commanded the smallest and weakest division in the army; one brigade was made of heavy artillery regiments that had not performed well in combat so far and Burnside himself had complained about their performance during the June 18 assaults on Petersburg. Worse than that, Ledlie was known as a coward; during the battle on June 18 he had hidden behind the lines and although his officers and enlisted men knew it, this escaped Burnside's notice.

Battle

The plan called for the mine to be detonated between 3:30 and 3:45 a.m. on the morning of July 30. Pleasants lit the fuse accordingly, but as with the rest of the mine's provisions, they had been given poor-quality fuses, which his men were forced to splice themselves. After more and more time passed and no explosion occurred (the impending dawn creating a threat to the men at the staging points, who were in view of the Confederate lines), two volunteers from the 48th Regiment (Lt. Jacob Douty and Sgt. Harry Reese) crawled into the tunnel. After discovering the fuse had burned out at a splice, they spliced on a length of new fuse and lit it again. Finally, at 4:44 a.m., the charges exploded in a massive shower of earth, men, and guns. A crater (still visible today) was created, 170 ft long, 100 to 120 ft wide, and at least 30 ft deep.

The explosion immediately killed 278 Confederate soldiers of the 18th and 22nd South Carolina and the stunned Confederate troops did not direct any significant rifle or artillery fire at the enemy for at least 15 minutes. However, Ledlie's untrained division was not prepared for the explosion, and reports indicate they waited 10 minutes before leaving their own entrenchments. Footbridges were supposed to have been placed to allow them to cross their own trenches quickly. Because they were missing, however, the men had to climb into and out of their own trenches just to reach no-man's land. Once they had wandered to the crater, instead of moving around it, as the USCT troops had been trained, they thought that it would make an excellent rifle pit in which to take cover. They therefore moved down into the crater itself, wasting valuable time and realizing too late that the crater was much too deep and exposed to function as a rifle pit and quickly becoming overcrowded while the Confederates, under Brigadier General William Mahone, gathered as many troops together as they could for a counterattack. In about an hour, they had formed up around the crater and began firing rifles and artillery down into it in what Mahone later described as a "turkey shoot."

Sensing that the plan had failed, Grant sent Meade an order to terminate the attack. Meade passed this order on to Burnside but the latter believed it could still work and ignored the order, so he sent in Ferrero's division. Burnside preferred to work from his headquarters so he had only a vague idea of what was going on at the front lines as disaster was unfolding. Now faced with considerable flanking fire, the USCT also descended into the crater, and for the next few hours, Mahone's soldiers, along with those of Major General Bushrod Johnson and artillery, slaughtered the IX Corps as Union soldiers attempted to escape from the crater or surrender. Confederates along the rim of the crater could be heard to yell "Take the white man prisoner! Kill the nigger!" The black Union soldiers who attempted to surrender were specifically targeted for battlefield execution or, if they were taken as prisoners, executed in the rear. Some of the officers in Ferrero's division removed their USCT badges, fearing the Confederates would also kill them on-site if they were captured and accounts by survivors of the battle report that some bayoneted black soldiers in the hope that the Confederates would be more lenient to them if they were captured. Ferrero himself was AWOL, having joined Ledlie in the rear to drink alcohol together. Some Union troops eventually advanced and flanked to the right beyond the crater to the earthworks and assaulted the Confederate lines, driving the Confederates back for several hours in hand-to-hand combat. Mahone's Confederates conducted a sweep out of a sunken gully area about 200 yd from the right side of the Union advance. The charge reclaimed the earthworks and drove the Union force back towards the east. The Confederates rained mortar shells into the crater, killing scores of men in the process. The weather was also very hot as it neared noon the sun was beating down on the crater relentlessly. Soldiers who were not killed outright by the Confederates dropped by the dozens from dehydration and heat stroke, worsened by the frantic mob of men jammed into a small area. Survivors could remember little due to the chaos in the crater, the shell fire, and the extreme heat. Some details were organized to pick up cartridges from the dead or run back to the Union lines to fetch water.

Aftermath
"Following the Crater affair a Reb wrote his homefolk that all the colored prisoners 'would have been killed had it not been for gen Mahone who beg our men to Spare them.' One of his comrades killed several, he continued; Mahone 'told him for God's sake stop.' The man replied, 'Well gen let me kill one more,' whereupon, according to the correspondent, 'he deliberately took out his pocket knife and cut one's throat.'"

Union casualties were 3,798 (504 killed, 1,881 wounded, 1,413 missing or captured), Confederate 1,491 (361 killed, 727 wounded, 403 missing or captured). Disproportionate Union losses were suffered by Ferrero's division of the United States Colored Troops, many of whom were summarily executed on the battlefield or in the rear. Compared to the average ratio for Civil War battles of 4.8 wounded to one dead, for black troops at the Crater it was 1.8 to one. Both black and white wounded prisoners were taken to the Confederate hospital at Poplar Lawn, in Petersburg. Burnside had not given up hope and he petitioned Meade to let him try another attack but General E.O.C. Ord dismissed the idea as absurd. Meade brought charges against Burnside, and a subsequent court of inquiry censured him along with Brig. Gens. Ledlie, Ferrero, Orlando B. Willcox, and Col. Zenas R. Bliss. Burnside was removed from command of the IX Corps on August 26 and replaced with General John G. Parke. Although he was as responsible for the defeat as Burnside, Meade escaped immediate censure. However, in early 1865, the Congressional Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War exonerated Burnside and condemned Meade for changing the plan of attack, which did little good for Burnside, whose reputation had been ruined. As for Mahone, the victory, won largely because of his efforts in supporting Johnson's stunned men, earned him a lasting reputation as one of the best young generals of Lee's army in the last years of the war.

Grant wrote to Chief of Staff Henry W. Halleck, "It was the saddest affair I have witnessed in this war." He also stated to Halleck, "Such an opportunity for carrying fortifications I have never seen and do not expect again to have."

Pleasants, who had no role in the battle itself, received praise for his idea and its execution. When he was appointed a brevet brigadier general on March 13, 1865, the citation made explicit mention of his role.

Grant subsequently gave in his evidence before the Committee on the Conduct of the War: "General Burnside wanted to put his colored division in front, and I believe if he had done so it would have been a success. Still I agreed with General Meade as to his objections to that plan. General Meade said that if we put the colored troops in front (we had only one division) and it should prove a failure, it would then be said and very properly, that we were shoving these people ahead to get killed because we did not care anything about them. But that could not be said if we put white troops in front.'"

Despite the battle being a tactical Confederate victory, the strategic situation in the Eastern Theater remained unchanged. Both sides remained in their trenches, and the siege continued.

Historic site
The area of the Battle of the Crater is a frequently-visited portion of Petersburg National Battlefield Park. The mine entrance is open for inspection annually on the anniversary of the battle. There are sunken areas, where air shafts and cave-ins extend up to the "T" shape near the end. The park includes many other sites, primarily those that were a portion of the Union lines around Petersburg.

In popular culture

 * The Battle of the Crater was graphically portrayed in the opening scenes of the 2003 film Cold Mountain, starring Jude Law as a Confederate soldier. The film inaccurately depicts the giant explosion occurring in broad daylight; it actually happened in darkness at 4:44 a.m.

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Semiotic literary criticism

Semiotic literary criticism, also called literary semiotics, is the approach to literary criticism informed by the theory of signs or semiotics. Semiotics, tied closely to the structuralism pioneered by Ferdinand de Saussure, was extremely influential in the development of literary theory out of the formalist approaches of the early twentieth century.

History
The early forms of literary semiotics grew out of formalist approaches to literature, especially Russian formalism, and structuralist linguistics, especially the Prague school. Notable early semiotic authors included Vladimir Propp, Algirdas Julius Greimas, and Viktor Shklovsky. These critics were concerned with a formal analysis of narrative forms which would resemble a literary mathematics, or at least a literary syntax, as far as possible. They proposed various formal notations for narrative components and transformations and attempted a descriptive taxonomy of existing stories along these lines.

Propp's Morphology of the Folktale (orig. Russian pub. 1928; English trans. 1958) provides an example of the formal and systematic approach. In successive chapters, Propp analyzes the characters, plot events, and other elements of traditional folktales (primarily from Russia and Eastern Europe). For each of these key components he provides a letter designation (with superscripts to designate specific subtypes). He proceeds to analyze individual tales by transposing them into this notation and then to generalize about their structure. For example:

 * Analysis of a simple, single-move tale of class H-I, of the type: kidnapping of a person.
 * 131. A tsar, three daughters (α). The daughters go walking (β³), overstay in the garden (δ¹).  A dragon kidnaps them (A¹).  A call for aid (B¹).  Quest of three heroes (C↑).  Three battles with the dragon (H¹–I¹), rescue of the maidens (K4).  Return (↓), reward (w°). (Propp 128)

He then gives the complete structure of this story in one line of notation, the analysis complete and ready to be compared systematically with other tales:

 * αβ³δ¹A¹B¹C↑H¹–I¹K4↓w°

Later semiotic approaches to literature have often been less systematic (or, in some special cases such as Roland Barthes's S/Z, they have been so specifically and exhaustively systematic as to render the possibility of a complete literary semiotics doubtful). As structuralist linguistics gave way to a post-structuralist philosophy of language which denied the scientific ambitions of the general theory of signs, semiotic literary criticism became more playful and less systematic in its ambitions. Still, some authors harbor more scientific ambition for their literary schemata than others. Later authors in the semiotic tradition of literary criticism include Tzvetan Todorov, Mikhail Bakhtin, Roland Barthes, Juri Lotman, Julia Kristeva, Michael Riffaterre, and Umberto Eco.

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Psychoanalytic literary criticism

Psychoanalytic literary criticism is literary criticism or literary theory that, in method, concept, or form, is influenced by the tradition of psychoanalysis begun by Sigmund Freud.

Psychoanalytic reading has been practiced since the early development of psychoanalysis itself, and has developed into a heterogeneous interpretive tradition. As Celine Surprenant writes, "Psychoanalytic literary criticism does not constitute a unified field. However, all variants endorse, at least to a certain degree, the idea that literature ... is fundamentally entwined with the psyche."

Psychoanalytic criticism views artists, including authors, as neurotic. However, an artist escapes many of the outward manifestations and end results of neurosis by finding in the act of creating his or her art a pathway back to sanity and wholeness.

Overview
The object of psychoanalytic literary criticism, at its very simplest, can be the psychoanalysis of the author or of a particularly interesting character in a given work. The criticism is similar to psychoanalysis itself, closely following the analytic interpretive process discussed in Freud's The Interpretation of Dreams and other works. Critics may view the fictional characters as psychological case studies, attempting to identify such Freudian concepts as the Oedipus complex, Freudian slips, Id, ego and superego, and so on, and demonstrate how they influence the thoughts and behaviors of fictional characters.

However, more complex variations of psychoanalytic criticism are possible. The concepts of psychoanalysis can be deployed with reference to the narrative or poetic structure itself, without requiring access to the authorial psyche (an interpretation motivated by French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan's remark that "the unconscious is structured like a language" ). Or the founding texts of psychoanalysis may themselves be treated as literature and reread for the light cast by their formal qualities on their theoretical content (Freud's texts frequently resemble detective stories, or the archaeological narratives of which he was so fond).

Like all forms of literary criticism, psychoanalytic criticism can yield useful clues to the sometime baffling symbols, actions, and settings in a literary work; however, like all forms of literary criticism, it has its limits. For one thing, some critics rely on psychocriticism as a "one size fits all" approach, when other literary scholars argue that no one approach can adequately illuminate or interpret a complex work of art. As Guerin, et al. put it in A Handbook of Critical Approaches to Literature, The danger is that the serious student may become theory-ridden, forgetting that Freud's is not the only approach to literary criticism. To see a great work of fiction or a great poem primarily as a psychological case study is often to miss its wider significance and perhaps even the essential aesthetic experience it should provide.

Early applications
Freud wrote several important essays on literature, which he used to explore the psyche of authors and characters, to explain narrative mysteries, and to develop new concepts in psychoanalysis (for instance, Delusion and Dream in Jensen's Gradiva and his influential readings of the Oedipus myth and Shakespeare's Hamlet in The Interpretation of Dreams). The criticism has been made, however, that in his and his early followers' studies 'what calls for elucidation are not the artistic and literary works themselves, but rather the psychopathology and biography of the artist, writer, or fictional characters'. Thus 'many psychoanalysts among Freud's earliest adherents did not resist the temptation to psychoanalyze poets and painters (sometimes to Freud's chagrin'). Later analysts would conclude that 'clearly one cannot psychoanalyse a writer from his text; one can only appropriate him'.

Early psychoanalytic literary criticism would often treat the text as if it were a kind of dream. This means that the text represses its real (or latent) content behind obvious (manifest) content. The process of changing from latent to manifest content is known as the dream work and involves operations of concentration and displacement. The critic analyzes the language and symbolism of a text to reverse the process of the dream work and arrive at the underlying latent thoughts. The danger is that 'such criticism tends to be reductive, explaining away the ambiguities of works of literature by reference to established psychoanalytic doctrine; and very little of this work retains much influence today'.

Jungians
Later readers, such as Carl Jung and another of Freud's disciples, Karen Horney, broke with Freud, and their work, especially Jung's, led to other rich branches of psychoanalytic criticism: Horney's to feminist approaches including womb envy, and Jung's to the study of archetypes and the collective unconscious. Jung's work in particular was influential as, combined with the work of anthropologists such as Claude Lévi-Strauss and Joseph Campbell, it led to the entire fields of mythocriticism and archetype analysis.

Northrop Frye considered that 'the literary critic finds Freud most suggestive for the theory of comedy, and Jung for the theory of romance'.

Form
Waugh writes, 'The development of psychoanalytic approaches to literature proceeds from the shift of emphasis from "content" to the fabric of artistic and literary works'. Thus for example Hayden White has explored how 'Freud's descriptions tally with nineteenth-century theories of tropes, which his work somehow reinvents'.

Especially influential here has been the work of Jacques Lacan, an avid reader of literature who used literary examples as illustrations of important concepts in his work (for instance, Lacan argued with Jacques Derrida over the interpretation of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Purloined Letter").

'Lacan's theories have encouraged a criticism which focuses not on the author but on the linguistic processes of the text'. Within this Lacanian emphasis, 'Freud's theories become a place from which to raise questions of interpretation, rhetoric, style, and figuration'.

However, Lacanian scholars have noted that Lacan himself was not interested in literary criticism per se, but in how literature might illustrate a psychoanalytic method or concept.

Reader response
According to Ousby, 'Among modern critical uses of psychoanalysis is the development of "ego psychology" in the work of Norman Holland, who concentrates on the relations between reader and text' – as with reader response criticism. Rollin writes that 'Holland's experiments in reader response theory suggest that we all read literature selectively, unconsciously projecting our own fantasies into it'.

Thus in crime fiction, for example, 'Rycroft sees the criminal as personifying the reader's unavowed hostility to the parent'.

Charles Mauron: psychocriticism
In 1963, Charles Mauron conceived a structured method to interpret literary works via psychoanalysis. The study implied four different phases:
 * 1) The creative process is akin to dreaming awake: as such, it is a mimetic, and cathartic, representation of an innate desire that is best expressed and revealed by metaphors and symbolically.
 * 2) Then, the juxtaposition of a writer's works leads the critic to define symbolical themes.
 * 3) These metaphorical networks are significant of a latent inner reality.
 * 4) They point at an obsession just as dreams can do. The last phase consists in linking the writer's literary creation to his own personal life.

On Mauron's concept, the author cannot be reduced to a ratiocinating self: his own more or less traumatic biographical past, the cultural archetypes that have suffused his soul contrast with the conscious self, The chiasmic relation between the two tales may be seen as a sane and safe acting out. A basically unconscious sexual impulse is symbolically fulfilled in a positive and socially gratifying way, a process known as Sublimation.

Anxiety of influence
'The American critic Harold Bloom has adopted the Freudian notion of the Oedipus Complex to his study of relationships of influence between poets...and his work has also inspired a feminist variant in the work of Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar'.

In similar vein, Shoshana Felman has asked with respect to what she calls "the guilt of poetry" the question: 'Could literary history be in any way considered as a repetitive unconscious transference of the guilt of poetry?'.

Cultural examples
In Small World: An Academic Romance, one of David Lodge's satires of academia, the naive hero Persse follows Angelica to a forum where she discourses on Romance: '"Roland Barthes has taught us the close connection between narrative and sexuality, between the pleasures of the body and the 'pleasure of the text'....Romance is a multiple orgasm." Persse listened to this stream of filth flowing from between Angelica's exquisite lips and pearly teeth with growing astonishment and burning cheeks, but no one else in the audience seemed to find anything remarkable or disturbing about her presentation'.

In A.S. Byatt's novel Possession, the heroine/feminist scholar, while recognising that '"we live in the truth of what Freud discovered"', concedes that '"the whole of our scholarship – the whole of our thought – we question everything except the centrality of sexuality"'.

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American black bear

The American black bear (Ursus americanus), also known as the black bear, is a species of medium-sized bear endemic to North America. It is the continent's smallest and most widely distributed bear species. It is an omnivore, with a diet varying greatly depending on season and location. It typically lives in largely forested areas but will leave forests in search of food and is sometimes attracted to human communities due to the immediate availability of food.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) lists the American black bear as a least-concern species because of its widespread distribution and a large population, estimated to be twice that of all other bear species combined. Along with the brown bear (Ursus arctos), it is one of only two modern bear species not considered by the IUCN to be globally threatened with extinction.

Taxonomy and evolution
Despite living in North America, American black bears are not closely related to brown bears or polar bears; genetic studies reveal that they split from a common ancestor 5.05 million years ago (mya). American and Asian black bears are considered sister taxa and are more closely related to each other than to the other modern species of bears. According to recent studies, the sun bear is also a relatively recent split from this lineage.

A small primitive bear called Ursus abstrusus is the oldest known North American fossil member of the genus Ursus, dated to 4.95 mya. This suggests that U. abstrusus may be the direct ancestor of the American black bear, which evolved in North America. Although Wolverton and Lyman still consider U. vitabilis an "apparent precursor to modern black bears", it has also been placed within U. americanus.

The ancestors of American black bears and Asian black bears diverged from sun bears 4.58 mya. The American black bear then split from the Asian black bear 4.08 mya. The earliest American black bear fossils, which were located in Port Kennedy, Pennsylvania, greatly resemble the Asian species, though later specimens grew to sizes comparable to grizzly bears. From the Holocene to the present, American black bears seem to have shrunk in size, but this has been disputed because of problems with dating these fossil specimens.

The American black bear lived during the same period as the giant and lesser short-faced bears (Arctodus simus and A. pristinus, respectively) and the Florida spectacled bear (Tremarctos floridanus). These tremarctine bears evolved from bears that had emigrated from Asia to the Americas 7–8 mya. The giant and lesser short-faced bears are thought to have been heavily carnivorous and the Florida spectacled bear more herbivorous, while the American black bears remained arboreal omnivores, like their Asian ancestors.

The American black bear's generalist behavior allowed it to exploit a wider variety of foods and has been given as a reason why, of these three genera, it alone survived climate and vegetative changes through the last Ice Age while the other, more specialized North American predators became extinct. However, both Arctodus and Tremarctos had survived several other, previous ice ages. After these prehistoric ursids became extinct during the last glacial period 10,000 years ago, American black bears were probably the only bear present in much of North America until the migration of brown bears to the rest of the continent.

Hybrids
American black bears are reproductively compatible with several other bear species and occasionally produce hybrid offspring. According to Jack Hanna's Monkeys on the Interstate, a bear captured in Sanford, Florida, was thought to have been the offspring of an escaped female Asian black bear and a male American black bear. In 1859, an American black bear and a Eurasian brown bear were bred together in the London Zoological Gardens, but the three cubs that were born died before they reached maturity. In The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication, Charles Darwin noted: "In the nine-year Report it is stated that the bears had been seen in the zoological gardens to couple freely, but previously to 1848 most had rarely conceived. In the reports published since this date three species have produced young (hybrids in one case), ..."

A bear shot in autumn 1986 in Michigan was thought by some to be an American black bear/grizzly bear hybrid, because of its unusually large size and its proportionately larger brain case and skull. DNA testing was unable to determine whether it was a large American black bear or a grizzly bear.

Subspecies
Sixteen subspecies are traditionally recognized; however, a recent genetic study does not support designating some of these, such as the Florida black bear, as distinct subspecies. Listed alphabetically according to subspecific name:

Distribution and population

Historically, American black bears occupied the majority of North America's forested regions. Today, they are primarily limited to sparsely settled, forested areas. American black bears currently inhabit much of their original Canadian range, though they seldom occur in the southern farmlands of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba; they have been extirpated on Prince Edward Island since 1937. Surveys taken in the mid-1990s found the Canadian black bear population to be between 396,000 and 476,000 in seven provinces; this estimate excludes populations in New Brunswick, the Northwest Territories, Nova Scotia and Saskatchewan. All provinces indicated stable populations of American black bears over the last decade.

The current range in the United States is constant throughout most of the Northeast and within the Appalachian Mountains almost continuously from Maine to northern Georgia, the northern Midwest, the Rocky Mountain region, the West Coast and Alaska. However, it becomes increasingly fragmented or absent in other regions. Despite this, American black bears in those areas seem to have expanded their range in recent decades, such as with recent sightings in Ohio, Illinois, southern Indiana, and western Nebraska. Sightings of itinerant black bears in the Driftless Area of southeastern Minnesota, northeastern Iowa, and southwestern Wisconsin are common. In 2019, biologists with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources confirmed documentation of an American black bear living year-round in woodlands near the town of Decorah in northeastern Iowa, believed to be the first instance of a resident black bear in Iowa since the 1880s.

Surveys taken from 35 states in the early 1990s indicated that American black bear populations were either stable or increasing, except in Idaho and New Mexico. The population in the United States was estimated to range between 339,000 and 465,000 in 2011, though this excludes populations from Alaska, Idaho, South Dakota, Texas and Wyoming, whose populations were not recorded in the survey. In California there were an estimated 25,000-35,000 black bears in 2017, making it the largest population of the species in any of the 48 contiguous United States. In 2020 there were about 1,500 bears in Great Smoky Mountains National Park, where the population density is about two per square mile. In western North Carolina, the black bear population has dramatically increased in recent decades, from about 3,000 in the early 2000s to over 8,000 in the 2020s.

As of 1993, known black bear populations in Mexico existed in four areas, though knowledge on the distribution of populations outside those areas has not been updated since 1959. Mexico is the only country where the species is classified as "endangered".

Habitat
Throughout their range, habitats preferred by American black bears have a few shared characteristics. They are often found in areas with relatively inaccessible terrain, thick understory vegetation and large quantities of edible material (especially masts). The adaptation to woodlands and thick vegetation in this species may have originally been because the bear evolved alongside larger, more aggressive bear species, such as the extinct giant short-faced bear and the grizzly bear, that monopolized more open habitats and the historic presence of larger predators, such as Smilodon and the American lion, that could have preyed on black bears. Although found in the largest numbers in wild, undisturbed areas and rural regions, American black bears can adapt to surviving in some numbers in peri-urban regions, as long as they contain easily accessible foods and some vegetative coverage.

In most of the contiguous United States, American black bears today are usually found in heavily vegetated mountainous areas, from 400 to 3000 m in elevation. For American black bears living in the American Southwest and Mexico, habitat usually consists of stands of chaparral and pinyon juniper woods. In this region, bears occasionally move to more open areas to feed on prickly pear cactus. At least two distinct, prime habitat types are inhabited in the Southeastern United States. American black bears in the southern Appalachian Mountains survive in predominantly oak-hickory and mixed mesophytic forests. In the coastal areas of the southeast (such as Florida, the Carolinas and Louisiana), bears inhabit a mixture of flatwoods, bays and swampy hardwood sites.

In the northeastern part of the range (the United States and Canada), prime habitat consists of a forest canopy of hardwoods such as beech, maple, birch and coniferous species. Corn crops and oak-hickory mast are also common sources of food in some sections of the northeast; small, thick swampy areas provide excellent refuge cover largely in stands of white cedar. Along the Pacific coast, redwood, Sitka spruce and hemlocks predominate as overstory cover. Within these northern forest types are early successional areas important for American black bears, such as fields of brush, wet and dry meadows, high tidelands, riparian areas and a variety of mast-producing hardwood species. The spruce-fir forest dominates much of the range of the American black bear in the Rockies. Important non-forested areas here are wet meadows, riparian areas, avalanche chutes, roadsides, burns, sidehill parks and subalpine ridgetops.

In areas where human development is relatively low, such as stretches of Canada and Alaska, American black bears tend to be found more regularly in lowland regions. In parts of northeastern Canada, especially Labrador, American black bears have adapted exclusively to semi-open areas that are more typical habitat in North America for brown bears (likely due to the absence there of brown and polar bears, as well as other large carnivore species).

Build
The skulls of American black bears are broad, with narrow muzzles and large jaw hinges. In Virginia, the length of adult bear skulls was found to average 262 to 317 mm. Across its range, the greatest skull length for the species has been reportedly measured from 23.5 to 35 cm. Females tend to have slenderer and more pointed faces than males.

Their claws are typically black or grayish-brown. The claws are short and rounded, being thick at the base and tapering to a point. Claws from both hind and front legs are almost identical in length, though the foreclaws tend to be more sharply curved. The paws of the species are relatively large, with a rear foot length of 13.7 to 22.5 cm, which is proportionately larger than other medium-sized bear species, but much smaller than the paws of large adult brown, and especially polar bears. The soles of the feet are black or brownish and are naked, leathery and deeply wrinkled.

The hind legs are relatively longer than those of Asian black bears. The typically small tail is 7.7 - 17.7 cm long. The ears are small and rounded and are set well back on the head.

American black bears are highly dexterous, being capable of opening screw-top jars and manipulating door latches. They also have great physical strength; a bear weighing 120 lb was observed turning flat rocks weighing 310 to 325 lb by flipping them over with a single foreleg. They move in a rhythmic, sure-footed way and can run at speeds of 25 to 30 mph. American black bears have good eyesight and have been proven experimentally to be able to learn visual color discrimination tasks faster than chimpanzees and just as fast as domestic dogs. They are also capable of rapidly learning to distinguish different shapes such as small triangles, circles and squares.

Size

Adults typically range from 120 to 200 cm in head-and-body length, and 70 to 105 cm in shoulder height. Although they are the smallest bear species in North America, large males exceed the size of other bear species, except the brown bear and the polar bear.

Weight tends to vary according to age, sex, health and season. Seasonal variation in weight is very pronounced: in autumn, their pre-den weight tends to be 30% higher than in spring, when black bears emerge from their dens. Bears on the East Coast tend to be heavier on average than those on the West Coast, although they typically follow Bergmann's rule, and bears from the northwest are often slightly heavier than the bears from the southeast. Adult males typically weigh between 57 - 250 kg, while females weigh 33% less at 41 - 170 kg.

In California, studies indicate that the average mass is 86 kg in adult males and 58 kg in adult females. Adults in Yukon Flats National Wildlife Refuge in east-central Alaska were found to average 87.3 kg in males and 63.4 kg in females, whereas on Kuiu Island in southeastern Alaska (where nutritious salmon are readily available) adults averaged 115 kg. In Great Smoky Mountains National Park, adult males averaged 112 kg and adult females averaged 47 kg per one study.

In one of the largest studies on regional body mass, bears in British Columbia averaged 73.7 kg in 89 females and 103.1 kg in 243 males. In Yellowstone National Park, a study found that adult males averaged 119 kg and adult females averaged 67 kg. Black bears in north-central Minnesota averaged 70 kg in 163 females and 125 kg in 77 males. In New York, the males average 136 kg and females 72.6 kg. It was found in Nevada and the Lake Tahoe region that bears closer to urban regions were significantly heavier than their arid-country dwelling counterparts, with males near urban areas averaging 138 kg against wild-land males which averaged 115.5 kg whereas peri-urban females averaged 97.9 kg against the average of 65.2 kg in wild-land ones. In Waterton Lakes National Park, Alberta, adults averaged 125 to 128 kg.

The biggest wild American black bear ever recorded was a male from New Brunswick, shot in November 1972, that weighed 409 kg after it had been dressed, meaning it weighed an estimated 500 kg in life and measured 2.41 m long. Another notably outsized wild American black bear, weighing in at 408 kg, was the cattle-killer shot in December 1921 on the Moqui Reservation in Arizona. The record-sized American black bear from New Jersey was shot in Morris County December 2011 and scaled 376.5 kg. The Pennsylvania state record weighed 399 kg and was shot in November 2010 in Pike County. The North American Bear Center, located in Ely, Minnesota, is home to the world's largest captive male and female American black bears. Ted, the male, weighed 431 - 453.5 kg in the fall of 2006. Honey, the female, weighed 219.6 kg in the fall of 2007.

Pelage

The fur is soft, with dense underfur and long, coarse, thick guard hairs. The fur is not as shaggy or coarse as that of brown bears. American black bear skins can be distinguished from those of Asian black bears by the lack of a white blaze on the chest and hairier footpads.

Despite their name, black bears show a great deal of color variation. Individual coat colors can range from white, blonde, cinnamon, light brown or dark chocolate brown to jet black, with many intermediate variations existing. Silvery-gray American black bears with a blue luster (this is found mostly on the flanks) occur along a portion of coastal Alaska and British Columbia. White to cream-colored American black bears occur in the coastal islands and the adjacent mainland of southwestern British Columbia. Albino individuals have also been recorded. Black coats tend to predominate in humid areas such as Maine, New England, New York, Tennessee, Michigan and western Washington. Approximately 70% of all American black bears are black, though only 50% in the Rocky Mountains are black. Many in northwestern North America are cinnamon, blonde or light brown in color and thus may sometimes be mistaken for grizzly bears. Grizzly (and other types of brown) bears can be distinguished by their shoulder hump, larger size and broader, more concave skull.

In his book The Great Bear Almanac, Gary Brown summarized the predominance of black or brown/blonde specimens by location:

Behavior and life history
American black bears have eyesight and hearing comparable to that of humans. Their keenest sense is smell, which is about seven times more sensitive than a domestic dog's. They are excellent and strong swimmers, swimming for pleasure and to feed (largely on fish). They regularly climb trees to feed, escape enemies and hibernate. Four of the eight modern bear species are habitually arboreal (the most arboreal species, the American and Asian black bears and the sun bear, being fairly closely related). Their arboreal abilities tend to decline with age. They may be active at any time of the day or night, although they mainly forage by night. Bears living near human habitations tend to be more extensively nocturnal, while those living near brown bears tend to be more often diurnal.

American black bears tend to be territorial and non-gregarious in nature. However, at abundant food sources (e.g. spawning salmon or garbage dumps), they may congregate and dominance hierarchies form, with the largest, most powerful males dominating the most fruitful feeding spots. They mark their territories by rubbing their bodies against trees and clawing at the bark. Annual ranges held by mature male bears tend to be very large, though there is some variation. On Long Island off the coast of Washington, ranges average 5 sqmi, whereas on the Ungava Peninsula in Canada ranges can average up to 1000 sqmi, with some male bears traveling as far as 4349 sqmi at times of food shortages.

Bears may communicate with various vocal and non-vocal sounds. Tongue-clicking and grunting are the most common sounds and are made in cordial situations to conspecifics, offspring and occasionally humans. When at ease, they produce a loud rumbling hum. During times of fear or nervousness, bears may moan, huff or blow air. Warning sounds include jaw-clicking and lip-popping. In aggressive interactions, black bears produce guttural pulsing calls that may sound like growling. Cubs squeal, bawl or scream when anxious and make a motor-like humming sound when comfortable or nursing. American black bears often mark trees using their teeth and claws as a form of communication with other bears, a behavior common to many species of bears.

Reproduction and development
Sows usually produce their first litter at the age of 3 to 5 years, with those living in more developed areas tending to get pregnant at younger ages. The breeding period usually occurs in the June–July period, though it can extend to August in the species' northern range. The breeding period lasts for two to three months. Both sexes are promiscuous. Males try to mate with several females, but large, dominant ones may violently claim a female if another mature male comes near. Copulation can last 20–30 minutes. Sows tend to be short-tempered with their mates after copulating.

The fertilized eggs undergo delayed development and do not implant in the female's womb until November. The gestation period lasts 235 days, and litters are usually born in late January to early February. Litter size is between one and six cubs, typically two or three. At birth, cubs weigh 280 – and measure 20.5 cm in length. They are born with fine, gray, down-like hair and their hind quarters are underdeveloped. They typically open their eyes after 28–40 days and begin walking after 5 weeks. Cubs are dependent on their mother's milk for 30 weeks and will reach independence at 16–18 months. At 6 weeks, they attain 900 g, by 8 weeks they reach 2.5 kg and by 6 months they weigh 18 to 27 kg. They reach sexual maturity at 3 years and attain their full growth at 5 years.

Longevity and mortality

The average lifespan in the wild is 18 years, though it is quite possible for wild individuals to survive for more than 23 years. The record age of a wild individual was 39 years, while that in captivity was 44 years. The average annual survival rate is variable, ranging from 86% in Florida to 73% in Virginia and North Carolina. In Minnesota, 99% of wintering adult bears were able to survive the hibernation cycle in one study. Remarkably, a study of American black bears in Nevada found that the amount of annual mortality of a population of bears in wilderness areas was 0%, whereas in developed areas in the state this figure rose to 83%. Survival in subadults is generally less assured. In Alaska, only 14–17% of subadult males and 30–48% of subadult females were found in a study to survive to adulthood. Across the range, the estimated number of cubs who survive past their first year is 60%.

With the exception of the rare confrontation with an adult brown bear or a gray wolf pack, adult black bears are not usually subject to natural predation. However, as evidenced by scats with fur inside of them and the recently discovered carcass of an adult sow with puncture marks in the skull, black bears may occasionally fall prey to jaguars in the southern parts of their range. In such scenarios, the big cat would have the advantage if it ambushed the bear, killing it with a crushing bite to the back of the skull. Cubs tend to be more vulnerable to predation than adults, with known predators including bobcats, coyotes, cougars, gray wolves, brown bears and other bears of their own species. Many of these will stealthily snatch small cubs right from under the sleeping mother. There is record of a golden eagle snatching a yearling cub. Once out of hibernation, mother bears may be able to fight off most potential predators. Even cougars will be displaced by an angry mother bear if they are discovered stalking the cubs. Flooding of dens after birth may also occasionally kill newborn cubs. However, in current times, bear fatalities are mainly attributable to human activities. Seasonally, thousands of black bears are hunted legally across North America to control their numbers, while some are illegally poached or trapped unregulated. Auto collisions also may claim many black bears annually.

Hibernation

American black bears were once not considered true or "deep" hibernators, but because of discoveries about the metabolic changes that allow black bears to remain dormant for months without eating, drinking, urinating or defecating, most biologists have redefined mammalian hibernation as "specialized, seasonal reduction in metabolism concurrent with scarce food and cold weather". American black bears are now considered highly efficient hibernators. The physiology of American black bears in the wild is closely related to that of bears in captivity. Understanding the physiology of bears in the wild is vital to the bear's success in captivity.

The bears enter their dens in October and November, although in the southernmost areas of their range (i.e. Florida, Mexico, the southeastern United States), only pregnant females and mothers with yearling cubs will enter hibernation. Prior to that time, they can put on up to 30 lb of body fat to get them through the several months during which they fast. Hibernation typically lasts 3–8 months, depending on regional climate.

Hibernating bears spend their time in hollowed-out dens in tree cavities, under logs or rocks, in banks, caves, or culverts, and in shallow depressions. Although naturally-made dens are occasionally used, most dens are dug out by the bear. During their time in hibernation, an American black bear's heart rate drops from 40 to 50 beats per minute to 8 beats per minute, and the metabolic rate can drop to a quarter of the bear's (nonhibernating) basal metabolic rate. These reductions in metabolic rate and heart rate do not appear to decrease the bear's ability to heal injuries during hibernation. Their circadian rhythm stays intact during hibernation. This allows the bear to sense the changes in the day based on the ambient temperature caused by the sun's position in the sky. It has also been shown that ambient light exposure and low disturbance levels (that is to say, wild bears in ambient light conditions) directly correlate with their activity levels. The bear keeping track of the changing days allows it to awaken from hibernation at the appropriate time of year to conserve as much energy as possible.

The hibernating bear does not display the same rate of muscle and bone atrophy relative to other nonhibernatory animals that are subject to long periods of inactivity due to ailment or old age. A hibernating bear only loses approximately half the muscular strength compared to that of a well-nourished, inactive human. The bear's bone mass does not change in geometry or mineral composition during hibernation, which implies that the bear's conservation of bone mass during hibernation is caused by a biological mechanism. During hibernation American black bears retain all excretory waste, leading to the development of a hardened mass of fecal material in the colon known as a fecal plug. Leptin is released into the bear's systems to suppress appetite. The retention of waste during hibernation (specifically in minerals such as calcium) may play a role in the bear's resistance to atrophy. The body temperature does not drop significantly, like other mammalian hibernators (staying around 35 C) and they remain somewhat alert and active. If the winter is mild enough, they may wake up and forage for food. Females also give birth in February and nurture their cubs until the snow melts. During winter, American black bears consume 25–40% of their body weight. The footpads peel off while they sleep, making room for new tissue.

Many of the physiological changes an American black bear exhibits during hibernation are retained slightly post-hibernation. Upon exiting hibernation, bears retain a reduced heart rate and basal metabolic rate. The metabolic rate of a hibernating bear will remain at a reduced level for up to 21 days after hibernation. After emerging from their winter dens in spring, they wander their home ranges for two weeks so that their metabolism accustoms itself to the activity. In mountainous areas, they seek southerly slopes at lower elevations for forage and move to northerly and easterly slopes at higher elevations as summer progresses.

The time that American black bears emerge from hibernation varies. Factors affecting this include temperature, flooding, and hunger. In southern areas, they may wake up in midwinter. Further north, they may not be seen until late March, April, or even early May. Altitude also has an effect. Bears at lower altitudes tend to emerge earlier. Mature males tend to come out earliest, followed by immature males and females, and lastly mothers with cubs. Mothers with yearling cubs are seen before those with newborns.

Dietary habits
Generally, American black bears are largely crepuscular in foraging activity, though they may actively feed at any time. Up to 85% of their diet consists of vegetation, though they tend to dig less than brown bears, eating far fewer roots, bulbs, corms and tubers than the latter species. When initially emerging from hibernation, they will seek to feed on carrion from winter-killed animals and newborn ungulates. As the spring temperature warms, American black bears seek new shoots of many plant species, especially new grasses, wetland plants and forbs. Young shoots and buds from trees and shrubs during the spring period are important to bears emerging from hibernation, as they assist in rebuilding muscle and strengthening the skeleton and are often the only digestible foods available at that time. During summer, the diet largely comprises fruits, especially berries and soft masts such as buds and drupes.

During the autumn hyperphagia, feeding becomes virtually the full-time task. Hard masts become the most important part of the diet in autumn and may even partially dictate the species' distribution. Favored masts such as hazelnuts, oak acorns and whitebark pine nuts may be consumed by the hundreds each day by a single bear during the fall. During the fall period, bears may also habitually raid the nut caches of tree squirrels. Also extremely important in fall are berries such as huckleberries and buffalo berries. Bears living in areas near human settlements or around a considerable influx of recreational human activity often come to rely on foods inadvertently provided by humans, especially during summertime. These include refuse, birdseed, agricultural products and honey from apiaries.

The majority of the diet consists of insects, such as bees, yellow jackets, ants, beetles and their larvae. American black bears are also fond of honey and will gnaw through trees if hives are too deeply set into the trunks for them to reach it with their paws. Once the hive is breached, the bears will scrape the honeycombs together with their paws and eat them, regardless of stings from the bees. Bears that live in northern coastal regions (especially the Pacific Coast) will fish for salmon during the night, as their black fur is easily spotted by salmon in the daytime. Other bears, such as the white-furred Kermode bears of the islands of western Canada, have a 30% greater success rate in catching salmon than their black-furred counterparts. Other fish, including suckers, trout and catfish, are readily caught whenever possible. Although American black bears do not often engage in active predation of other large animals for much of the year, the species will regularly prey on mule and white-tailed deer fawns in spring, given the opportunity. Bears may catch the scent of hiding fawns when foraging for something else and then sniff them out and pounce on them. As the fawns reach 10 days of age, they can outmaneuver the bears, and their scent is soon ignored until the next year. American black bears have also been recorded similarly preying on elk calves in Idaho and moose calves in Alaska.

Predation on adult deer is rare, but it has been recorded. They may even hunt prey up to the size of adult female moose, which are considerably larger than themselves, by ambushing them. There is at least one record of a male American black bear killing two bull elk over the course of six days by chasing them into deep snow banks, which impeded their movements. In Labrador, American black bears are exceptionally carnivorous, living largely off caribou, usually young, injured, old, sickly or dead specimens, and rodents such as voles. This is believed to be due to a paucity of edible plant life in this sub-Arctic region and a local lack of competing large carnivores (including other bear species). Like brown bears, American black bears try to use surprise to ambush their prey and target the weak, injured, sickly or dying animals in the herds. Once a deer fawn is captured, it is frequently torn apart alive while feeding. If it is able to capture a mother deer in spring, the bear frequently begins feeding on the udder of lactating females, but generally prefers meat from the viscera. Bears often drag their prey to cover, preferring to feed in seclusion. The skin of large prey is stripped back and turned inside out, with the skeleton usually left largely intact. Unlike gray wolves and coyotes, Bears rarely scatter the remains of their kills. Vegetation around the carcass is usually matted down, and their droppings are frequently found nearby. Bears may attempt to cover remains of larger carcasses, though they do not do so with the same frequency as cougars and grizzly bears. They will readily consume eggs and nestlings of various birds and can easily access many tree nests, even the huge nests of bald eagles. Bears have been reported stealing deer and other game from human hunters.

Interspecific predatory relationships
Over much of their range, American black bears are assured scavengers that can intimidate, using their large size and considerable strength, and if necessary dominate other predators in confrontations over carcasses. However, on occasions where they encounter Kodiak or grizzly bears, the larger two brown subspecies dominate them. American black bears tend to escape competition from brown bears by being more active in the daytime and living in more densely forested areas. Violent interactions, resulting in the deaths of American black bears, have been recorded in Yellowstone National Park.

American black bears do occasionally compete with cougars over carcasses. Like brown bears, they will sometimes steal kills from cougars. One study found that both bear species visited 24% of cougar kills in Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks, usurping 10% of the carcasses. Another study found that American black bears visited 48% of cougar kills in summer in Colorado and 77% of kills in California. As a result, the cats spend more time killing and less time feeding on each kill.

American black bear interactions with gray wolves are much rarer than with brown bears, due to differences in habitat preferences. The majority of American black bear encounters with wolves occur in the species' northern range, with no interactions being recorded in Mexico. Despite the American black bear being more powerful on a one-to-one basis, packs of wolves have been recorded to kill black bears on numerous occasions without eating them. Unlike brown bears, American black bears frequently lose against wolves in disputes over kills. Wolf packs typically kill American black bears when the larger animals are in their hibernation cycle.

There is at least one record of an American black bear killing a wolverine (Gulo gulo) in a dispute over food in Yellowstone National Park. Anecdotal cases of alligator predation on American black bears have been reported, though such cases may involve assaults on cubs. At least one jaguar (Panthera onca) has been recorded to have attacked and eaten a black bear: "El Jefe", the jaguar famous for being the first jaguar seen in the United States in over a century.

Indigenous
Black bears feature prominently in the stories of some of North America's indigenous peoples. One tale tells of how the black bear was a creation of the Great Spirit, while the grizzly bear was created by the Evil Spirit. In the mythology of the Haida, Tlingit and Tsimshian people of the northwest coast, mankind first learned to respect bears when a girl married the son of a black bear chieftain. In Kwakwa̱ka̱ʼwakw mythology, black and brown bears became enemies when Grizzly Bear Woman killed Black Bear Woman for being lazy. Black Bear Woman's children, in turn, killed Grizzly Bear Woman's children. The Navajo believed that the Big Black Bear was chief among the bears of the four directions surrounding Sun's house and would pray to it in order to be granted its protection during raids.

Sleeping Bear Dunes in Michigan is named after a Native American legend, where a female bear and her two cubs swam across Lake Michigan to escape a fire on the Wisconsin shore. The mother bear reached the shore and waited for her cubs, but they did not make it across. Two islands mark where the cubs drowned, while the dune marks the spot where the mother bear waited.

Anglo-American
Morris Michtom, the creator of the teddy bear, was inspired to make the toy when he came across a cartoon of Theodore Roosevelt refusing to shoot a black bear cub tied to a tree. The fictional character Winnie-the-Pooh was named after Winnipeg, a female cub that lived at the London Zoo from 1915 until her death in 1934. A cub, who in the spring of 1950 was caught in the Capitan Gap Fire, was made into the living representative of Smokey Bear, the mascot of the United States Forest Service.

Terrible Ted was a de-toothed and de-clawed bear who was forced to perform as a pro wrestler and whose "career" lasted from the 1950s to the 1970s. The American black bear is the mascot of the University of Maine and Baylor University, where the university houses two live bears on campus.

Attacks on humans

Although an adult bear is quite capable of killing a human, American black bears typically avoid confronting humans. Unlike grizzly bears, which became a subject of fearsome legend among the European settlers of North America, black bears were rarely considered overly dangerous, even though they lived in areas where the pioneers had settled.

American black bears rarely attack when confronted by humans and usually only make mock charges, emit blowing noises and swat the ground with their forepaws. The number of attacks on humans is higher than those by brown bears in North America, but this is largely because black bears considerably outnumber brown bears. Compared to brown bear attacks, aggressive encounters with black bears rarely lead to serious injury. Most attacks tend to be motivated by hunger rather than territoriality and thus victims have a higher probability of surviving by fighting back rather than submitting. Unlike female brown bears, female American black bears are not as protective of their cubs and rarely attack humans in the vicinity of the cubs. However, occasionally such attacks do occur. The worst recorded attack occurred in May 1978, in which a bear killed three teenagers fishing in Algonquin Park in Ontario. Another exceptional attack occurred in August 1997 in Liard River Hot Springs Provincial Park in British Columbia, when an emaciated bear attacked a mother and child, killing the mother and a man who intervened. The bear was shot while mauling a fourth victim.

The majority of attacks happened in national parks, usually near campgrounds, where the bears had habituated to close human proximity and food. Of 1,028 incidents of aggressive acts toward humans, recorded from 1964 to 1976 in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, 107 resulted in injury and occurred mainly in tourist hot spots where people regularly fed the bears handouts. In almost every case where open garbage dumps that attracted bears were closed and handouts ceased, the number of aggressive encounters dropped. However, in the Liard River Hot Springs case, the bear was apparently dependent on a local garbage dump that had closed and so was starving to death. Attempts to relocate bears are typically unsuccessful, as the bears seem able to return to their home range, even without familiar landscape cues.

Livestock and crop predation
A limitation of food sources in early spring and wild berry and nut crop failures in summer may contribute to bears regularly feeding from human-based food sources. These bears often eat crops, especially during autumn hyperphagia when natural foods are scarce. Favored crops include apples, oats and corn. American black bears can do extensive damage in areas of the northwestern United States by stripping the bark from trees and feeding on the cambium. Livestock depredations occur mostly in spring.

Although they occasionally hunt adult cattle and horses, they seem to prefer smaller prey such as sheep, goats, pigs and young calves. They usually kill by biting the neck and shoulders, though they may break the neck or back of the prey with blows with the paws. Evidence of a bear attack includes claw marks and is often found on the neck, back and shoulders of larger animals. Surplus killing of sheep and goats is common. American black bears have been known to frighten livestock herds over cliffs, causing injuries and death to many animals; whether this is intentional is not known. Occasionally bears kill pets, especially domestic dogs, which are most prone to harass a bear. It is not recommended to use unleashed dogs to deter bear attacks. Although large, aggressive dogs can sometimes cause a bear to run, if pressed, angry bears often turn the tables and end up chasing the dogs in return. A bear in pursuit of a pet dog can threaten both canid and human lives.

Hunting
The hunting of American black bears has taken place since the initial settlement of the Americas. The first piece of evidence dates to a Clovis site at Lehner Ranch, Arizona. Partially calcined teeth of a 3-month old black bear cub came from a roasting pit, suggesting the bear cub was eaten. The surrounding charcoal was dated to the Early Holocene (10,940 BP). Black bear remains also appear to be associated with early peoples in Tlapacoya, Mexico. Native Americans increasingly utilized black bears during the Holocene, particularly in the late Holocene upper Midwest, e.g., Hopewell and Mississippian cultures.

Some Native American tribes, in admiration for the American black bear's intelligence, would decorate the heads of bears they killed with trinkets and place them on blankets. Tobacco smoke would be wafted into the disembodied head's nostrils by the hunter that dealt the killing blow, who would compliment the animal for its courage. The Kutchin typically hunted American black bears during their hibernation cycle. Unlike the hunting of hibernating grizzly bears, which was fraught with danger, hibernating American black bears took longer to awaken and hunting them was thus safer and easier. During the European colonisation of eastern North America, thousands of bears were hunted for their meat, fat and fur. Theodore Roosevelt wrote extensively on black bear hunting in his Hunting the Grisly and other sketches, in which he stated,

"in [a black bear] chase there is much excitement, and occasionally a slight spice of danger, just enough to render it attractive; so it has always been eagerly followed."

He wrote that black bears were difficult to hunt by stalking, due to their habitat preferences, though they were easy to trap. Roosevelt described how, in the southern states, planters regularly hunted bears on horseback with hounds. General Wade Hampton was known to have been present at 500 successful bear hunts, two-thirds of which he killed personally. He killed 30 or 40 bears with only a knife, which he would use to stab the bears between the shoulder blades while they were distracted by his hounds. Unless well trained, horses were often useless in bear hunts, as they often bolted when the bears stood their ground. In 1799, 192,000 American black bear skins were exported from Quebec. In 1822, 3,000 skins were exported from the Hudson's Bay Company. In 1992, untanned, fleshed and salted hides were sold for an average of $165.

In Canada, black bears are considered as both a big game and furbearer species in all provinces, save for New Brunswick and the Northwest Territories, where they are only classed as a big game species. There are around 80,900 licensed bear hunters in Canada. Canadian black bear hunts take place in the fall and spring, and both male and female bears can be legally taken, though some provinces prohibit the hunting of females with cubs, or yearlings.

Currently, 28 of the U.S. states have American black bear hunting seasons. Nineteen states require a bear hunting license, with some also requiring a big game license. In eight states, only a big game license is required. Overall, over 481,500 American black bear hunting licenses are sold per year. The hunting methods and seasons vary greatly according to state, with some bear hunting seasons including fall only, spring and fall, or year-round. New Jersey, in November 2010, approved a six-day bear-hunting season in early December 2010 to slow the growth of the population. Bear hunting had been banned in New Jersey for five years before that time. A Fairleigh Dickinson University PublicMind poll found that 53% of New Jersey voters approved of the new season if scientists concluded that bears were leaving their usual habitats and destroying private property. Men, older voters and those living in rural areas were more likely to approve of a bear hunting season in New Jersey than women, younger voters and those living in more developed parts of the state. In the western states, where there are large American black bear populations, there are spring and year-round seasons. Approximately 18,000 American black bears were killed annually in the U.S. between 1988 and 1992. Within this period, annual kills ranged from six bears in South Carolina to 2,232 in Maine. According to Dwight Schuh in his Bowhunter's Encyclopedia, American black bears are the third most popular quarry of bowhunters, behind deer and elk.

Meat
Bear meat had historically been held in high esteem among North America's indigenous people and colonists. American black bears were the only bear species the Kutchin hunted for their meat, though this constituted only a small part of their diet. According to the second volume of Frank Forester's Field Sports of the United States, and British Provinces, of North America:

"The flesh of the [black] bear is savoury, but rather luscious, and tastes not unlike pork. It was once so common an article of food in New-York as to have given the name of Bear Market to one of the principal markets of the city."

Theodore Roosevelt likened the flesh of young American black bears to that of pork, and not as coarse or flavorless as the meat of grizzly bears. The most favored cuts of are concentrated in the legs and loins. Meat from the neck, front legs and shoulders is usually ground into minced meat or used for stews and casseroles. Keeping the fat on tends to give the meat a strong flavor. As American black bears can have trichinellosis, cooking temperatures need to be high in order to kill the parasites.

Bear fat was once valued as a cosmetic article that promoted hair growth and gloss. The fat most favored for this purpose was the hard white fat found in the body's interior. As only a small portion of this fat could be harvested for this purpose, the oil was often mixed with large quantities of hog lard. However, animal rights activism over the last decade has slowed the harvest of these animals; therefore the lard from bears has not been used in recent years for the purpose of cosmetics.

title: American black bear


text:
Lake Huron

Lake Huron is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is shared on the north and east by the Canadian province of Ontario and on the south and west by the U.S. state of Michigan. The name of the lake is derived from early French explorers who named it for the indigenous people they knew as Huron (Wyandot) inhabiting the region. Hydrologically, Lake Huron comprises the eastern portion of Lake Michigan–Huron, having the same surface elevation as Lake Michigan, to which it is connected by the 5 mi, 20 fathom Straits of Mackinac. Combined, Lake Michigan–Huron is the largest freshwater lake by area in the world. The Huronian glaciation was named from evidence collected from Lake Huron region. The northern parts of the lake include the North Channel and Georgian Bay. Saginaw Bay is located in the southwest corner of the lake. The main inlet is the St. Marys River from Lake Superior, and the main outlet is through the St. Clair River toward Lake Erie. Lake Huron has a fairly large drainage basin covering parts of Michigan and Ontario. Water flows through Lake Huron faster than the other Great Lakes with a retention time of only 22 years.

Geography
By surface area, Lake Huron is the second-largest of the Great Lakes, with a surface area of 23007 mi2—of which 9103 mi2 lies in Michigan and 13904 mi2 lies in Ontario—making it the third-largest fresh water lake on Earth (or the fourth-largest lake, if the Caspian Sea is counted as a lake). By volume however, Lake Huron is only the third largest of the Great Lakes, being surpassed by Lake Michigan and Lake Superior. When measured at the low water datum, the lake contains a volume of 850 mi3 and a shoreline length (including islands) of 3827 mi.

The surface of Lake Huron is 577 ft above sea level. The lake's average depth is 32 fathoms 3 feet (195 ft), while the maximum recorded (by sonar) depth is 125 fathom. It has a length of 206 smi and a greatest breadth of 183 smi. A large bay that protrudes northeast from Lake Huron into Ontario, Canada, is called Georgian Bay. A notable feature of the lake is Manitoulin Island, which separates the North Channel and Georgian Bay from Lake Huron's main body of water. It is the world's largest lake island. A smaller bay that protrudes southwest from Lake Huron into Michigan is called Saginaw Bay.

Cities with over 10,000 people on Lake Huron include Sarnia, the largest city on Lake Huron, and Saugeen Shores in Canada and Bay City, Port Huron, and Alpena in the United States. Major centres on Georgian Bay include Owen Sound, Wasaga Beach, Collingwood, Midland, Penetanguishene, Port Severn and Parry Sound.

Water levels
Historic high water The lake fluctuates from month to month with the highest lake levels in October and November. The normal high-water mark is 2.00 ft above datum (577.5 ft or 176.0 m). In the summer of 1986, Lakes Michigan and Huron reached their highest level at 5.92 ft above datum. The high-water records were broken for several months in a row in 2020.

Historic low water Lake levels tend to be the lowest in winter. The normal low-water mark is 1.00 ft below datum (577.5 ft or 176.0 m). In the winter of 1964, Lakes Michigan and Huron reached their lowest level at 1.38 ft below datum. As with the high-water records, monthly low-water records were set each month from February 1964 through January 1965. During this twelve-month period, water levels ranged from 1.38 to(-) below Chart Datum. The all-time low-water mark was eclipsed in January 2013.

Geology
Lake Huron has the largest shore line length of any of the Great Lakes, counting its 30,000 islands. It is separated from Lake Michigan, which lies at the same level, by the 5 mi, 20 fathom Straits of Mackinac, making them hydrologically the same body of water (sometimes called Lake Michigan-Huron and sometimes described as two 'lobes of the same lake'). Aggregated, Lake Huron-Michigan, at 45300 sqmi, "is technically the world's largest freshwater lake". Lake Superior, at 21 feet higher elevation, drains into the St. Marys River which then flows into Lake Huron. The water then flows south to the St. Clair River, at Port Huron, Michigan and Sarnia, Ontario. The Great Lakes Waterway continues thence to Lake St. Clair; the Detroit River and Detroit, Michigan; into Lake Erie and thence – via Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River – to the Atlantic Ocean.

Like the other Great Lakes, it was formed by melting ice as the continental glaciers retreated toward the end of the last ice age. Before this, Lake Huron was a low-lying depression through which flowed the now-buried Laurentian and Huronian Rivers; the lake bed was criss-crossed by a large network of tributaries to these ancient waterways, with many of the old channels still evident on bathymetric maps.

The Alpena-Amberley Ridge is an ancient ridge beneath the surface of Lake Huron, running from Alpena, Michigan, southwest to Point Clark, Ontario.

History
About 9,000 years ago, when water levels in Lake Huron were approximately 100 m below today's levels, the Alpena-Amberley Ridge was exposed. That land bridge was used as a migration route for large herds of caribou. Since 2008, archaeologists have discovered at least 60 stone constructions along the submerged ridge that are thought to have been used as hunting blinds by Paleo-Indians. That a trade network brought obsidian from Oregon almost ten thousand years ago to be used for toolmaking was confirmed by a 2013 underwater discovery along the ridge.

On the eve of European contact, the extent of development among Eastern Woodlands Native American societies is indicated by the archaeological evidence of a town on or near Lake Huron that contained more than one hundred large structures housing a total population of between 4,000 and 6,000. The French, the first European visitors to the region, often referred to Lake Huron as La Mer Douce, "the fresh-water sea". In 1656, a map by French cartographer Nicolas Sanson refers to the lake by the name Karegnondi, a Wyandot word that has been translated variously, as "Freshwater Sea", "Lake of the Hurons", or simply "lake". Generally, the lake was labeled "Lac des Hurons" (Lake of the Huron) on most early European maps.

By the 1860s, many European settlements on the shores of Lake Huron were becoming incorporated, including Sarnia, the largest city on Lake Huron. On October 26, 2010, the Karegnondi Water Authority was formed to build and manage a pipeline from the lake to Flint, Michigan.

Shipwrecks
More than a thousand wrecks have been recorded in Lake Huron. Of these, 185 are located in Saginaw Bay, and 116 are found in the 448 mi2 Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary and Underwater Preserve, which was established in 2000. Georgian Bay contains 212 sunken vessels.

Purportedly the first European vessel to sail the Great Lakes, Le Griffon also became the first ship lost on the Great Lakes. It was built in 1679 on the eastern shore of Lake Erie near Buffalo, New York. Robert Cavalier, Sieur de la Salle navigated across Lake Erie, up the Detroit River, Lake St. Clair and the St. Clair River out into Lake Huron. Passing the Straits of Mackinac, La Salle made landfall on Washington Island, off the tip of the Door Peninsula on the Wisconsin side of Lake Michigan. La Salle filled Le Griffon with pelts and in late November 1679 sent Le Griffon back to the site of modern-day Buffalo, never to be seen again. Two wrecks have been identified as Le Griffon, although neither has gained final verification as the actual wreck. Blown by a fierce storm after leaving, Le Griffon ran aground before the storm. The people of Manitoulin Island say that the wreck in Mississagi Strait at the western tip of the island is that of Le Griffon. Meanwhile, others near Tobermory, say that the wreck on Russell Island, 150 mi farther east in Georgian Bay, is that of Le Griffon.

Storm of 1913
On November 9, 1913, the Great Lakes Storm of 1913 in Lake Huron sank 10 ships, and more than 20 were driven ashore. The storm, which raged for 16 hours, killed 235 seamen.

Matoa—a propeller freighter measuring 2,311 gross register tons—had passed between Port Huron, Michigan, and Sarnia, Ontario, just after midnight. On November 9, just after six in the morning, Senator pushed upstream. Less than an hour later, Manola—a propeller freighter of 2,325 gross register tons also built in Cleveland in 1890—passed through. Captain Frederick W. Light of Manola reported that both the Canadian and the American weather stations had storm flag signals flying from their weather towers. Following behind at 7:00 a.m. that Sunday, Regina steamed out of Sarnia into the northwest gale. The warnings had been up for four hours. Manola passed Regina off Port Sanilac, 22 smi up the lake. Captain Light determined that if it continued to deteriorate, he would seek shelter at Harbor Beach, Michigan, another 30 smi up the lake. There, he could seek shelter behind the breakwater. Before he reached Harbor Beach, the winds turned to the northeast and the lake began to rise. It was noon when he reached Harbor Beach and ran for shelter.

The waves were so violent that Manola touched bottom entering the harbor. With help from a tugboat, Manola tied up to the break wall with eight lines. It was about 3:00 p.m. when Manola was secured and the crew prepared to drop anchor. As they worked, the cables began to snap from wind pressure against the hull. To keep from being pushed aground, they kept their bow into the wind with the engines running half to full in turns, yet the ship still drifted 800 ft before its movement was arrested. Waves breaking over the ship damaged several windows, and the crew reported seeing portions of the concrete break wall peeling off as the waves struck it. Meanwhile, fifty miles farther up the lake, Matoa and Captain Hugh McLeod had to ride out the storm without a safe harbor. Matoa was found stranded on the Port Austin reef when the winds subsided.

It was noon on Monday before the winds let up and not until 11:00 p.m. that night before Captain Light determined it to be safe to continue his journey. Although Manola survived the storm, she was renamed Mapledawn in 1920, and on November 24, 1924, she became stranded on Christian Island in Georgian Bay. It was declared a total loss. Salvagers were able to recover approximately 75,000 bushels of barley.

Ecology
Lake Huron has a lake retention time of 22 years. Like all of the Great Lakes, the ecology of Lake Huron has undergone drastic changes in the last century. The lake originally supported a native deepwater fish community dominated by lake trout, which fed on several species of ciscos as well as sculpins and other native fishes. Several invasive species, including sea lamprey, alewife and rainbow smelt, became abundant in the lake by the 1930s. The major native top predator, lake trout, was virtually extirpated from the lake by 1950 through a combination of overfishing and the effects of sea lamprey. Several species of ciscos were also extirpated from the lake by the 1960s; the only remaining native ciscoes are bloater and Cisco (lake herring). Non-native Pacific salmon have been stocked in the lake since the 1960s, but are less abundant since a profound food web change that took place in 2003. Lake trout have also been stocked for decades in an attempt to rehabilitate the species and today are largely self sustaining, especially in the northern half of the lake.

Lake Huron has suffered recently by the introduction of a variety of new invasive species, including zebra and quagga mussels, the spiny water flea, and round gobies. The demersal fish community of the lake was in a state of collapse by 2006, and a number of drastic changes have been observed in the zooplankton community of the lake. Chinook salmon catches have also been greatly reduced in recent years, and lake whitefish have become less abundant and are in poor condition. These recent changes may be attributable to the new exotic species. Some native species, however were beneficiaries of these chances (principally a result of the almost complete disappearance of the invasive Alewife in the lake). These native species include Lake Trout and Walleye. The Walleye population in Saginaw Bay area of Lake Huron reached recovery targets in 2009.

Cities
Michigan

 * Alpena
 * Au Gres
 * Bay City
 * Caseville
 * Cheboygan
 * East Tawas
 * Essexville
 * Harbor Beach
 * Harrisville
 * Lexington
 * Mackinac Island
 * Port Huron
 * Rogers City
 * St. Ignace
 * Tawas CityOntario

 * Collingwood
 * Goderich
 * Midland
 * Owen Sound
 * Parry Sound
 * Penetanguishene
 * Point Edward
 * Port Elgin
 * Sarnia
 * Severn

Lighthouses

 * Interactive map of lighthouses, Georgian Bay, Lake Huron
 * Interactive map of lighthouses in North and East Lake Huron
 * Interactive map of lighthouses in North and West Lake Huron

title: Lake Huron


text:
Talk:Great Lakes

Location map
It'd be nice to see a location map. The satellite and other maps, as zoomed in as they are, don't reflect it's location within the US. The Eloquent Peasant (talk) 14:30, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Depth / volume graphic
The vertical scale doesn’t match up with the graphic, (eg lake Michigan’s maximum depth of 925ft doesn’t match with the scale on the left). Also, the Lake Ontario block in that graphic is mis-sized vertically compared to the others.

Is a corrected graphic available? 72.73.26.250 (talk) 10:59, 24 January 2023 (UTC)

Units
Why does this article, like articles of all the Great Lakes, use imperial / US customary units first, despite that Great Lakes are also in Canada, a country that uses metric units? --40bus (talk) 22:15, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Well, of the five Great Lakes, four are partly in Canada and partly in the United States. The fifth is entirely in the United States.  I don't say that's the reason, because I don't know.  But there it is.  And if the articles started using metric first, to begin with, one could then ask, "Why does this article ... [you can fill in the rest]," and secondly, the article on Lake Michigan would arguably need to be different. Uporządnicki (talk) 22:18, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

title: Talk:Great Lakes