How can something so small be so big?

I guess my bay is bigger than your 'bay' because your 'bay' is not actually a bay

Last year I moved to Three Mile Bay, NY, and thus I now overlook (one of) the largest freshwater bay in the world.

At least that’s what the sign in nearby Chaumont says.

Technically, Chaumont Bay includes the smallish trio of Three Mile Bay, Guffin Bay and Sawmill Bay. But together they are mighty. Don’t believe me? Just Google World's Largest Freshwater Bay.

Unfortunately, I spent four decades in journalism and well, you know, I tend to question absolutes. And so, I wondered: Is what I read online actually true?

I grew up in Michigan and so I know a thing or two about Green Bay off Lake Michigan and Georgian Bay off Lake Huron in Canada. I don’t need Google Earth/Maps/Docs/Alerts to know that you could put Chaumont Bay in either one of those other bays several times over. For heaven’s sake, Georgian Bay is 80 percent the size of the Great Lake Ontario.

So, what gives?

I asked a retiree of the New York Department of Conservation about Chaumont’s claim and, evidently, I am not the first person to broach the subject. He said he’s considered the claim to be suspect for years.

“It depends on what you call a freshwater bay,” said the fish expert who has no interest in being part of my public debate.

I told him that I looked up Green Bay online and found that it is not actually a “bay,” but rather the World's Largest Freshwater Estuary.

He said he thinks the whole thing is a game of semantics. 

“Green Bay is no more an estuary than Chaumont Bay,” he said.

And Georgian Bay? Because there are 30,000 islands within the boundary of Georgian Bay, it is considered the World's Largest Freshwater Archipelago.

Naturally, the state retiree quibbled with that, too.

“Georgian Bay is large enough that it should be considered the sixth Great Lake,” he said, and then added this caveat: “Actually, because Michigan, Huron and Georgian are at the same (feet above sea level) and all get their water from Lake Superior, they should be considered just one lake.”

My speculative source speculates that the narrow strait between Pillar Point and Point Peninsula, which allows water to flow from Chaumont Bay to Lake Ontario, might be the reason why it is considered a bay while Green and Georgian “bays,” with large mouths flowing into Lakes Michigan and Huron respectively, are not.

So, I guess that settles that, and I give up. With camera in hand, I will now return to enjoying another shark-free summer on (one of) the world’s largest freshwater bay.