Everything about Puget Sound totally explained
Puget Sound is an arm of the
Pacific Ocean, connected to the rest of the Pacific by the
Strait of Juan de Fuca, in the
Pacific Northwest of the
United States. It branches out from
Admiralty Inlet and
Deception Pass in the north to
Olympia, Washington in the south. The surrounding land partially overlaps the
Seattle metropolitan area, home to about 4 million people.
Name and definition
There are various definitions of the extent and boundaries of Puget Sound.
In 1792
George Vancouver gave the name "Puget's Sound" to the waters south of the
Tacoma Narrows. The name later came to be used for the waters north of Tacoma Narrows as well.
The
USGS defines Puget Sound as all the waters south of three entrances — the main entrance at
Admiralty Inlet being a line between
Point Wilson, on the
Olympic Peninsula, and
Point Partridge, on
Whidbey Island; a second entrance at
Deception Pass being a line from West Point, on Whidbey Island, to Deception Island and Rosario Head, on
Fidalgo Island; and a third entrance at the south end of the Swinomish Channel, which connects
Skagit Bay and
Padilla Bay. Under this defintion, Puget Sound includes the waters of
Hood Canal, Admiralty Inlet,
Possession Sound,
Saratoga Passage, and others. It doesn't include
Bellingham Bay,
Padilla Bay, the waters of the
San Juan Islands or anything farther north.
Another definition, given by
NOAA, subdivides Puget Sound into five basins or regions. Four of these correspond to areas within the USGS definition, but the fifth one, called "Northern Puget Sound" includes a large additional region. It is defined as bounded to the north by the international boundary with Canada, and to the west by a line running north from the mouth of the
Sekiu River on the Olympic Peninsula. Under this definition significant parts of the
Strait of Juan de Fuca and the
Strait of Georgia are included in Puget Sound, with the international boundary marking an abrupt and hydrologically arbitrary limit.
According to Arthur Kruckeberg, the term "Puget Sound" is sometimes used for waters north of Admiralty Inlet and Deception Pass, especially for areas along the north coast of Washington and the San Juan Islands, essentially equivalent to NOAA's "Northern Puget Sound" subdivision described above. Kruckeberg uses the term "Puget Sound and adjacent waters".
An alternative term for Puget Sound, still used by only some Native Americans and environmental groups, is
Whulge (or Whulj), an Anglicization of the Lushootseed name 'WulcH, which means "Salt Water".. Another neologism also popularized by environmental and aboriginal groups is
Salish Sea, but this doesn't have wide acceptance nor a single standard meaning from one group to the next. Sometimes the terms "Puget Sound" and "Puget Sound and adjacent waters" are used for not only Puget Sound proper but also for waters to the north, such as
Bellingham Bay and the
San Juan Islands region.
History
George Vancouver explored Puget Sound in 1792. Vancouver claimed it for
Great Britain on
4 June 1792. It became part of the
Oregon Country, and became a USA territory when the 1846
Oregon Treaty was signed.
Due to the migration along the
Oregon Trail, many settlers wandered north to what is now Washington State and settled the Puget Sound area. The first non-Aboriginal settlement was New Market (now known as
Tumwater) in 1846 . In 1853
Washington Territory was formed from part of
Oregon Territory. In 1888 the
Northern Pacific railroad line reached Puget Sound, linking the region to eastern states.
For a long period Tacoma was noted for its large smelters where gold, silver, copper and lead ores were treated. Seattle was the primary port for trade with
Alaska and the rest of the country and for a time possessed a large shipbuilding industry. The region around eastern Puget Sound developed heavy industry during the period including
World War I and
World War II, and the
Boeing Company became an established icon in the area.
During World War II the Puget Sound area became a focus for the war industry, with Boeing producing many of the nation's
heavy bombers and the ports of Seattle,
Bremerton and Tacoma available for shipbuilding.
Since 1995, Puget Sound has been recognized as an
American Viticultural Area by the
Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau.
Geology
The
United States Geological Survey (USGS) defines Puget Sound as a
bay with numerous channels and branches; more specifically, it's a
fjord system of flooded glacial valleys. Puget Sound is part of a larger physiographical structure termed the Puget Trough, which is a physiographic section of the larger
Pacific Border province, which in turn is part of the larger
Pacific Mountain System.
Puget Sound is a very large salt water
estuary, or system of many estuaries, fed by highly seasonal freshwater from the Olympic and Cascade Mountain watersheds. The northern boundary is Admiralty Inlet, between Point Partridge on
Whidbey Island and Point Wilson on the
Olympic Peninsula. A second entrance is Deception Pass, between West Point on Whidbey Island and Rosario Head on
Fidalgo Island.
The Sound has been reshaped by the scouring action and till deposition of the
Wisconsin Glaciation, which extended in this region as far south as Olympia; the soils of the region, less than ten thousand years old, are still characterized as immature. During glacial maximum a large meltwater lake formed at the icewall's forefront, drained by the
Chehalis River; its sediments form the blue-gray clay identified as the Lawton Clay. As icebergs calved off the toe of the glacier, their embedded gravels and boulders were deposited in the chaotic mix of unsorted
till geologists call
glaciomarine drift. Many beaches about the Sound display
glacial erratics, rendered more prominent than those in coastal woodland solely by their exposed position; submerged glacial erratics sometimes provide hazards to navigation. The sheer weight of glacial-age ice depressed the landforms, which experienced
isostatic rebound after the ice sheets had retreated; because the rate of rebound wasn't synchronous with the post-ice age rise in sea levels, the bed of what is Puget Sound, filled alternately with fresh and with sea water. The upper level of the lake-sediment Lawton Clay now lies about 120 feet (37 m) above sea level.
The Puget Sound system consists of four deep basins connected by shallower sills. The four basins are Hood Canal, west of the Kitsap Peninsula, Whidbey Basin, east of Whidbey Island, South Sound, south of the Tacoma Narrows, and the Main Basin, which is further subdivided into Admiralty Inlet and the Central Basin. Puget Sound's sills, a kind of submarine
terminal moraine, separate the basins from one another, and Puget Sound from the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Three sills are paricularly significant — the one at Admiralty Inlet which checks the flow of water between the Strait of Juan de Fuca and Puget sound, the one at the entrance to Hood Canal (about below the surface), and the one at the Tacoma Narrows (about ). Other sills that present less of a barrier include the ones at
Blake Island,
Agate Pass,
Rich Passage, and
Hammersley Inlet.. To the south, the existence of a second fault, the
Tacoma Fault has buckled the intervening strata in the Seattle Uplift.
Typical Puget Sound profiles of dense glacial till overlying permeable glacial outwash of gravels above an impermeable bed of silty clay may become unstable after periods of unusually wet weather and slump in landslides.
Geography
The urban region designated the Puget Sound Region is centered on Seattle, Washington, and consists of nine
counties, two urban center
cities and four satellite cities making up what has been dubbed "Pugetopolis". Both urban core cities have large industrial areas and
seaports plus a high-rise
central business district. The satellite cities are primarily
suburban, featuring a small downtown core and a small industrial area or
port. The suburbs consist mostly of residences,
strip malls, and shopping centers. The region is also home to numerous ports. The two largest and busiest are the
Port of Seattle and
Port of Tacoma, which, if combined, comprise the second largest container port in North America after Los Angeles/Long Beach.
A unique state-run ferry system, the
Washington State Ferries, connects the larger islands to the Washington mainland, as well as both sides of the sound, allowing cars and people to move about the greater Puget Sound region.
Wildlife
Geoduck: It is estimated that more than 100 million geoducks are packed into Puget Sound's sediments. Also known as "king clam," geoducks are considered to be a delicacy in Asian countries.
Counties of the Puget Sound region
Prominent islands
Anderson Island
Bainbridge Island
Blake Island
Camano Island
Fidalgo Island
Fox Island
Harstine Island
Indian Island
Marrowstone Island
Maury Island
McNeil Island
Squaxin Island
Vashon Island
Whidbey Island
Urban centers
Seattle
Tacoma
Olympia
Satellite cities
Everett
Bellevue
Bremerton
Other principal cities
Auburn
Des Moines
Edmonds
Federal Way
Kent
Kirkland
Lynnwood
Marysville
Mount Vernon
Mukilteo
Redmond
Renton
Shoreline
Snohomish
Trivia
Puget Sound is mentioned in the song "Frances Farmer Will Have Her Revenge On Seattle", by the grunge band Nirvana.
Puget Sound is mentioned in the song "This Place is a Prison", by indie-rock band the Postal Service.
Puget Sound features in the Tugboat Annie magazine stories, movies, and television series.
Puget Sound is the title of a song by UK based DJ Aim from the album Flight 602Further Information
Get more info on 'Puget Sound'.
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