Toponymie | Canton de Potton | Place Names

Huart translates to loon in English.  Loons are aquatic birds of the Gaviidae family, and are known as “divers”.  Specialist fish-eaters, they can dive as deep as 200 feet (60 m) for their prey.  They are graceful and strong swimmers, but are ungainly on land due to the positioning of the legs at the rear of the body.  Loons fly competently for hundreds of kilometers in migration.  Four species exist in Canada, with the “common loon” being the one found in Potton.  The loon's bill is stout and sharp pointed.  The back is chequered and the white neckband is incomplete.  The North-American name “loon” is a reference to the bird's clumsiness on land, and is derived from Scandinavian words for lame – such as Icelandic “làºinn” and Swedish “lam”.  The loon's call is a distinctive tremolo, which has often been described as haunting.

The common loon is immortalized on the Canadian one-dollar coin.  The “loonie” was introduced in June 1987 to replace our paper $1.00 bill.^[1]