Sable Island is a sandbar island minding its own business 177 kilometres off the coast of mainland Nova Scotia (300 kilometres southeast of Halifax) and close to the edge of the Continental Shelf. The crescent-shaped island has sometimes been measured at just over 43 kilometres in length and a mere 1.2 kilometres wide. Those measurements are flexible due to the ceaseless erosion and unrelenting winds and waves that are constantly reshaping the island. Also helping out are the southerly storms which have flung sand from the ocean bed up onto the south shore of the island, while the Gulf Stream adds what it finds to the northeast beach. Thus, Sable (French for sand) Island’s actual boundaries continue to be a moving target.
There are no trees. There are only wide expanses of sand dunes topped off by a mixture of beach grasses and heathland plants. In 1901 the government planted 80,000 trees on the island in an attempt to stabilize the ‘soil’ only for all of them to die. 80,000 dead saplings. That makes a statement. Clearly uncertain about what that statement was, they launched another attempt in the 1960s. Only one (1) tree took, and then that stunted Scots Pine also gave up the ghost. Clearly the environment does not want trees on this particular island.
Although the establishment of a permanent settlement didn’t happen until 1801, France tried to populate the island in 1599 with a collection of criminals, lay-abouts, and a handful of soldiers, in hope of using the spot for the fishing industry and fur trade. The guy spearheading the idea, one Troilus du Mesgouez, marquis de La Roche-Helgomarche, viceroy of New France (wow), didn’t get back to the island to check up on things but he did send a supply ship annually. Four years later, when he called for the man he’d put in charge to return to France with a report of the new colony’s assumed successes, the ship that was sent found only 11 souls still alive out of the 70 people that had been left there. Most of the reluctant settlers had died during the first year due to weather, the lack of supplies, or at the hands of other colonists. The remaining 11 had been able to keep themselves alive by living somewhat ferally in mud caves that they had had to dig in order to survive the harsh weather conditions. And each other. They were all brought back to France and treated as novelty heroes.
So, that experiment didn’t end up working.
When Mother Nature left Sable Island in place after the glaciers from the last ice age retreated, she also left a web of submerged sandbars around the island. Those hidden sandbars are mostly responsible for the 350 shipwrecks littering the sea around the island. Bad storms at sea, the 127 days per year that the island is shrouded in fog, and the dangerous ocean currents nearby, have also played their part. In 1801, the governor of Nova Scotia (when it was still a British Colony) decided that a rescue station was needed to provide a continuous presence of rescuers on the island, offering help and refuge to those who escaped shipwrecking, as well as to warn passing ships of the dangers. The island was added in on the paperwork as a Canadian asset during Confederation in 1867 and therefore was able to get funding for a lighthouse on the eastern tip of the island and also one on the western tip. Both replaced lookout towers and flag stations used by the rescue teams on the island.
Previous to all this, there had been a failed attempt by a guy from Boston to make Sable more habitable and he landed horses, cattle, pigs, and sheep on the island. Very little is written about that attempt other than in passing along with word “Failed”, but it is thought that the Sable Island wild horses might owe a bit of their lineage to horses who survived that effort, as well as to the horses that were brought in to aid in rescue station operations after 1801.
These days the wild Sable Island horses are famous. They are smaller than a horse and fall into the pony category. This is due to their restricted diet of marram grasses and scrubby heathland bounty, and their limited access to fresh water. There ARE freshwater pools on the island, just not a lot of them. The horses are strictly protected by law from any human interference. They (the horses) grow a shaggy coat to weather the winters, which then molts (sometimes successfully) during the warmer months. There are about 500 of the little fellas on the island these days. (Who else has an overwhelming urge to hug one???)
While there have gradually become other accepted areas as the species has strengthened, grey seals prefer going to Sable Island to give birth to their young. There are no natural predators on the island, although sharks live in the surrounding precinct. The mother seals have their pups on the beach, tend to their every need for 16 days, then head back into the sea leaving the babies to figure things out for themselves. Like latch key kids. They do figure it out but they live on the island for about 3 more weeks before leaving. Probably out of boredom.
The tiny Ipswitch Sparrow lives most of her life along the mainland of the Atlantic coast but heads to Sable to lay her eggs and raise her chicks. 175 kilometres of open water to the mainland. Imagine that first big flight for the young ones. Mind-boggling.
Not that the average person would notice, but there are at least 6 species of invertebrates that are specific to Sable Island and somehow someone figured out that Sable Island has its own sweat bee that has chosen to live solely on its sandbar island out at the edge of the Continental Shelf and nowhere else in the world.
The other special breed that chooses to live on Sable Island are the people; between 3 – 20 depending on the season. Most of those people are researchers pursuing their fascinating work or they are the amazing Parks Canada staff there to keep the island and its communications functioning, and to make sure the grey seal pups don’t go rogue.
Only sailors who get shipwrecked in the neighbourhood are allowed to land on Sable Island without permission. Each year there are between 420 – 450 people who apply for, and are granted, access to visit this surreal and astonishing place for themselves. If you decide to go, keep in mind that they’ll probably frisk you when you arrive so leave your contraband sugar cubes at home. As was proven so long ago, there’s no room for a criminal element on this sandbar!
