North America Arctic Islands

The largest archipelago in the world in land area does not have a name. Composed of Greenland and the adjacent Canadian Arctic islands, this vast area is a largely barren expanse of tundra, icecap, and peaks surrounded by an endless maze of often-frozen waterways. Not one tree grows in the 3.4 million square kilometers of land that supports a mere 100,000 people. In contrast, the Malay-Indonesian archipelago from New Guinea to Suamtra (second largest in the world) overflows with over 200 million people in its 2.9 million square kilometers.

The bounaries of the North American Arctic Islands Range2 are clear--it includes Greenland and all islands north of the Canadian mainland and Hudson Bay. Also included are the Boothia and Melville peninsulas, surrounded by islands and connected to the mainland by narrow ithmuses.

There are plenty of substantial mountains on these islands. Greenland is a small version of Antarctica, a giant, high icecap with rugged fiords and high peaks on its edges. The western Canadian Arctic Islands (for example, Banks, Victoria, and Melville) are very low and flat, but the eastern edge of this group rises to high, impressive cliffs and summits that border Baffin Bay on Baffin, Bylot, Devon, and Ellesmere Islands.

Note: Range borders shown on map are an approximation and are not authoritative.