Sable Island

Sable Island is situated 180 km southeast of Nova Scotia, Canada in the Atlantic Ocean. The island is a crescent-shaped sandbar[?] emerging from the vast shoals and shallows which historically caused many shipwrecks. Almost 2 km at its widest point, it is about 38 km long and is covered with grass and other low-growing vegetation. Sable means "sand" in French.

It is home to over 250 wild horses who are protected by law from human interference. Several large bird colonies are here, Arctic terns, and Ipswich sparrows[?] who breed nowhere else.

Begining over 200 years ago, lighthouse and life-saving crews and their animals have inhabited the island. A brief attempt at colonization at the end of the 16th century by the French failed. Meteorological and atmospheric studies are routinely conducted on Sable because of its unique geographic position down-wind from the mainland.

Sable Island is mentioned in the book and a staged version appears in the movie The Perfect Storm[?]. The island is specifically mentioned in the Constitution of Canada and is presently under the administrative control of the Canadian Coast Guard.

Mercator projection: public domain Online Map Creation (http://www.aquarius.geomar.de/omc/)

Bibliography

• "Sable Island Shipwrecks: Disaster and Survival at the North Atlantic Graveyard" by Lyall Campbell, Nimbus pub., ISBN 1551090961, December 2001
• " Ethos of Voice in the Journal of James Rainstorpe Morris from the Sable Island Humane Station, 1801-1802", by Rosalee Stilwell, ISBN 0773476636, Edwin Mellen Press, January  2001
• "Sable Island", by Bruce Armstrong, ISBN 0385131135, Doubleday, July  1981
• "Wild Horses of Sable Island", by Zoe Lucas, ISBN 0919872735, Firefly Books Ltd., August 1992
• "Wild and Beautiful Sable Island", Pat Keough et al., ISBN 096925573X, Green Publishing,September 1993
• "Sable Island Journals 1801-1804", by James Rainstorpe Morris, ISBN 0968924506

External links

• Sable Island Green Horse Society (http://www.greenhorsesociety.com/)
• Sable Island Preservation Trust (http://www.sabletrust.ns.ca/)