db wrote on Apr 11^th, 2010 at 6:29am:

34G is referencing Azalea's Quetico Campsite Database. If that topo was made today there wouldn't be two unconnected points between it and the twin islands to the north. At some point they raised and later, in the late 70's I think, lowered the lake level. The sand has been collecting there for 40+ years forming the new isthmus. The Alder thicket follows in a few years and holds it all in place. Kinda cool to see such a dramatic change in a few decades actually. My first trip out of French began paddling past mud banks and drowned, ready to fall trees. It looked creepy. Really creepy. In a word, ugly. These days there's new beauty around every corner - and there's a lot of corners in that short little stretch.

I guess I should say "PCD site 34G" or something like that for a clue.  If you click on each of these links, you can compare the topo and closer-to-reality aerial photo from 2002.  The time I paddled cleanly over the isthmus was in May of 1992, very high water.  We did only a slight bottom-drag in early July 2001.  The POD pic was early Aug 2008.

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The story I've heard is that Pickerel was ~4 feet higher when the topos were made.  It was dammed during the logging days.  The dam still exists, but was put down to original lake level in the 70s. That's why all the nice sand beaches on Pickerel, I've heard, eh?

-Tom