Jordan Pond is an oligotroph

Oligotroph

An oligotroph is an organism that can live in an environment that offers very low levels of nutrients. They may be contrasted with copiotrophs, which prefer nutritionally rich environments...

ic tarn

Tarn (lake)

A tarn is a mountain lake or pool, formed in a cirque excavated by a glacier. A moraine may form a natural dam below a tarn. A corrie may be called a cirque.The word is derived from the Old Norse word tjörn meaning pond...

 in Acadia National Park

Acadia National Park

Acadia National Park is a National Park located in the U.S. state of Maine. It reserves much of Mount Desert Island, and associated smaller islands, off the Atlantic coast...

 near the town of Bar Harbor, Maine

Maine

Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost...

. It covers 187 acres (75.7 ha), with a maximum depth of 150 feet (45.7 m) and a shoreline of 3.6 miles (5.8 km).

The pond was formed by the Wisconsin Ice Sheet during the last glacial period. It is flanked on the west by Penobscot Mountain and to the northeast by the two mountains known as the Bubbles. The southern end, and outflow, are limited by the natural Jordan Pond moraine

Moraine

A moraine is any glacially formed accumulation of unconsolidated glacial debris which can occur in currently glaciated and formerly glaciated regions, such as those areas acted upon by a past glacial maximum. This debris may have been plucked off a valley floor as a glacier advanced or it may have...

, which has been supplemented by a small dam.

The pond has clear water, with visibility normally 46 feet (14 m) and occasions of up to 60 feet (18.3 m) recorded, the deepest in Maine. It serves as the water supply for the village of Seal Harbor. It does not experience dissolved oxygen depletion in the lake depths.

Some types of boating are permitted, but humans and pets must stay out of the water.

Park usage

Park officials estimate that roughly 60% of park visitors will visit the pond, primarily the tea-house at the southern end, at some point in their stay. The pond is ringed by a walking trail, from which branch off trails to or over several other park features. One of the park's original carriage trails runs along a ridge adjoining the pond.

The Jordan family of Seal Harbor, for whom the pond is named, built a farmhouse near the pond. In the 1870s a restaurant known as the Jordan Pond House was built. Under the management of the McIntires, which ran from 1895 to 1946, the restaurant became a regular location for high society

Upper class

In social science, the "upper class" is the group of people at the top of a social hierarchy. Members of an upper class may have great power over the allocation of resources and governmental policy in their area.- Historical meaning :...

 events. John D. Rockefeller, Jr.

John D. Rockefeller, Jr.

John Davison Rockefeller, Jr. was a major philanthropist and a pivotal member of the prominent Rockefeller family. He was the sole son among the five children of businessman and Standard Oil industrialist John D. Rockefeller and the father of the five famous Rockefeller brothers...

 purchased the restaurant and gave it to the National Park Service

National Park Service

The National Park Service is the U.S. federal agency that manages all national parks, many national monuments, and other conservation and historical properties with various title designations...

. The original building was destroyed by fire in June 1979, and a new building built through private fund raising. The Jordan Pond House has a gift shop and a restaurant serving lunch and dinner; it is perhaps best known for its service of tea and popover

Popover

A popover is a light, hollow roll made from an egg batter similar to that of Yorkshire pudding, typically baked in muffin tins.Popovers may be served either as a sweet, topped with fruit and whipped cream for breakfast or with afternoon tea, or with meats at lunch and dinner.-Name:The name...

s both on the enclosed veranda and outdoors on the lawn overlooking Jordan Pond.

Flora and fauna

Jordan Pond was for a period the type locality for the type specimen for the quillwort

Quillwort

Isoëtes, also written Isoetes and commonly known as the quillworts, is a genus of plants in the class Isoetopsida and order Isoetales. They are considered "fern allies". There are about 140-150 species, with a cosmopolitan distribution but often scarce to rare...

 species described by Alvah Augustus Eaton and formerly known as Isoetes macróspora var. heteróspora or Isoetes heterospora. It was then thought to be located only in this pond. This is now considered to be a synonym

Synonym (taxonomy)

In scientific nomenclature, a synonym is a scientific name that is or was used for a taxon of organisms that also goes by a different scientific name. For example, Linnaeus was the first to give a scientific name to the Norway spruce, which he called Pinus abies...

 for Isoetes lacustris

Isoetes lacustris

Isoetes lacustris is a boreal quillwort native on both sides of the northern Atlantic Ocean. In Europe, it is distributed from Poland west to northeastern France, throughout Scandinavia, the west and north of the British Isles, the Faroe Islands and Iceland...

, which is found in both North America and Europe. Four other quillwort species are also found in the lake, along with three species of pondweed

Potamogeton

Potamogeton is a genus of aquatic, mostly freshwater, plants of the family Potamogetonaceae. Most are known by the common name pondweed, although many unrelated plants may be called pondweed, such as Canadian pondweed...

, two species each of rushes

Juncus

Juncus is a genus in the plant family Juncaceae. It consists of some 200 to 300 or more species of grassy plants commonly called rushes...

, bur-reeds

Sparganium

Sparganium is a genus of flowering plants, containing about 20 species in temperate regions of both the Northern and Southern Hemispheres. It was previously placed alone in the family Sparganiaceae...

, and carnivorous bladderworts, and at least six other species of plants.

Fish species in the lake include landlocked Atlantic salmon

Atlantic salmon

The Atlantic salmon is a species of fish in the family Salmonidae, which is found in the northern Atlantic Ocean and in rivers that flow into the north Atlantic and the north Pacific....

, lake trout

Lake trout

Lake trout is a freshwater char living mainly in lakes in northern North America. Other names for it include mackinaw, lake char , touladi, togue, and grey trout. In Lake Superior, they can also be variously known as siscowet, paperbellies and leans...

, brook trout

Brook trout

The brook trout, Salvelinus fontinalis, is a species of fish in the salmon family of order Salmoniformes. In many parts of its range, it is known as the speckled trout or squaretail. A potamodromous population in Lake Superior are known as coaster trout or, simply, as coasters...

, rainbow smelt

Rainbow smelt

The rainbow smelt, Osmerus mordax, is an anadromous species of fish of the family Osmeridae. The distribution of Osmerus mordax is circumpolar. The rainbow smelt was introduced to the Great Lakes, and from there has made its way to various other places. Walleye, trout, and other larger fish prey on...

, four species of minnow

Cyprinid

The family Cyprinidae, from the Ancient Greek kyprînos , consists of the carps, the true minnows, and their relatives . Commonly called the carp family or the minnow family, its members are also known as cyprinids...

, banded killifish

Banded killifish

The banded killifish , is a North American species of temperate freshwater killifish belonging to the Fundulus genus of the Fundulidae family. The natural geographic range extends from Newfoundland to South Carolina, and west to Minnesota. It occupies the Great Lakes drainages...

, three-spined stickleback

Three-spined stickleback

The three-spined stickleback, Gasterosteus aculeatus, is a fish native to much of northern Europe, northern Asia and North America. It has been introduced into parts of southern and central Europe.-Distribution and morphological variation:...

, pumpkinseed

Pumpkinseed

The pumpkinseed sunfish is a freshwater fish of the sunfish family of order Perciformes. It is also referred to as "pond perch", "common sunfish", "punkys", and "sunny".-Range and distribution:...

 sunfish, and the American eel

American eel

The American eel, Anguilla rostrata, is a catadromous fish found on the eastern coast of North America. It has a snake-like body with a small sharp pointed head. It is brown on top and a tan-yellow color on the bottom. It has sharp pointed teeth but no pelvic fins...

. The landlocked salmon, lake trout, smelt, sticklebacks, and at least one species of minnow are known to have been introduced and/or stocked by humans.

External links

• Lake Overview and Data Access compiled and organized by the University of Maine