years ago, a huge body of water, the Champlain Sea, covered the St. Lawrence Lowlands, the name for the eastern part of this region, which extends from Quebec City to Brockville and up the Ottawa River Valley. When, after 2000 years, the sea disappeared along with the retreat of the glaciers, it left behind rich deposits of clay over the Paleozoic bedrock. Throughout the Mixed Woods Plains, there are extensive glacial deposits in the form of moraines and drumlins.The latter – which are elongated or oval-shaped hills that run in the direction of the original movement of ice – account for the rolling hills in areas like Haliburton, northeast of Toronto.

There is little variation in the climate across