Early Lake Erie

Early Lake Erie was a prehistoric proglacial lake that existed at the end of the last ice age approximately 13,000 years ago. The early Erie fed waters to Glacial Lake Iroquois.

The ancient lake was similar in size to the current lake during glacial retreat, but for some period the western half of the lake was covered with ice.

Early-period Lake Erie was made up of smaller lakes (Lakes Warren, Wayne, Maumee and Lundy) with lower depths. Much of the ancient lake bed is now northern Ohio.

12,000 years before present (YBP) the Laurentian ice sheet had melted to the east creating an outlet for the Lake Erie basin at the Niagara Escarpment. Simultaneously, the ice sheet had opened a drainage between Lake Algonquin and Lake Ontario thorough the Kirkfield Outlet. This ended the outflow from Lake Algonquin into the Lake Erie Basin. Holocene history of Lake Erie began with a flood of water over the Niagara Escarpment. The flood created a channel in the moraines and bedrock lower water level in the Erie basin. The Niagara River Outlet, was over 50 metres (160 ft) lower than the present level of Lake Erie creating a non-glacial lake, called Early Lake Erie. At this stage water elevation was 120 metres (390 ft) above sea level. The lake consisted of two lobes, one in the eastern basin and a smaller lake in the central basin.

About 10,400 YBP the ice sheet advancement southward, blocking the Kirkfield Outlet. Once again, the Lake Erie basin received water from Lake Algonquin, through the Port Huron Outlet and the new St. Clair River-Lake St. Clair-Detroit River system. The additional water created a marshy swamp in the western basin, then it created a river system through the Pelee Passage. The shallow central basin overflowed the Norfolk Moraine creating the Pennsylvania Channel into the eastern basin. The deeper eastern basin overflowed Niagara Escarpment by the Niagara River for a brief time. There is still a division of ideas about whether Early Lake Erie overflowed the Niagara River at this time or remained without an overflow.

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Wikipedia