Reading the Tables

The table of ice charts and data contains all the information that has been gathered so far. The objective has been to draw an ice chart for each of the winter months January and February combined, March, and April. This has been possible from about 1859 onwards but prior to that year, in most cases, there was simply not enough information for 3 maps. In the worst case, probably very light ice years, only a best guess for the winter as a whole could be deduced. In such cases the title on the map states only the year and not a month.

The "General" title within the Table contains general broad information about that year as a whole, such as extent or severity, or information that cannot be associated specifically to one month. Most years from 1810 to about 1923 have some general information; after that year most information was obtained from the IIP Bulletins. The monthly titles within the Table contain the map for that month along with relevant ice sightings and information for that month. Please refer to "Details of the Data" for interpretation of the map and symbols. The "May" title does not at the moment contain any maps but does contain any information that pertains to that month and subsequent months. Generally, the sea ice extent has peaked before May and is receding but it is also the time when icebergs can be at their peak numbers. It has to be stressed that the month of May was not researched; only incidental records while searching the earlier months have been included. The cell labelled "Pre-1810" contains all ice sightings that have been found during this study from the year 1527. Finally, the "Data" title within the Table contains the monthly sightings for that year for pack ice and icebergs separately. A numeral "1" before the coordinates (in decimal degrees) indicates an ice sighting. A numeral "0" indicates that it is associated with the preceding coordinate as explained earlier.

The geographical coordinates (decimal degress) of the line defining the ice edge limits are also to be found under "Data".

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