The Land

Canada’s terrestrial ecozones and what the land is covered by.

The lay of the land

Canada spans 15 terrestrial ecozones: broad regions defined by their climate, landforms, soils, and vegetation. They range from the Arctic Cordillera’s ice-capped mountains to the Prairies’ grasslands and the Mixedwood Plains that hold most of the population around the lower Great Lakes and St. Lawrence. The single largest ecozone is the Boreal Shield, iconically made up of rocks and conifers. Each ecozone (landforms, climate, soils, and vegetation) is described in detail in Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada’s National Ecological Framework for Canada.

What covers the land

The same ecozones, shaded by land cover. i.e., the share of each region that is forest, cropland, water, wetland, snow and ice, and so on (2020). Use the dropdown to switch the mapped class. The Prairies are about 60% cropland. The boreal zones are overwhelmingly treed. The Arctic ecozones are barren or sparsely vegetated. Canada has an enormous number of lakes and rivers; inland water covers more than a fifth of the Taiga Shield.

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