Toponymie | Canton de Potton | Place Names

The word étang in French is the equivalent of “pond” in English, but we're speaking of a brook that comes from a pond – specifically Sugarloaf Pond.  The Ruisseau de l'Étang wends its way over several sinuous kilometres before finally reaching the Missisquoi North River.

A pond is generally considered to be a body of water, usually shallow and stagnant, with dimensions of more than a pool but less than a lake.  A pond is sometimes characterized as being a small body of water that is shallow enough for sunlight to reach the bottom, permitting the growth of rooted plants at its deepest point.  “Pond” usually implies a quite small body of water, generally smaller than one would require a boat to cross.  Often colonized by shore vegetation, ponds may also become a habitat for fish and batrachia, which is a zoological term for frogs and toads.  Natural or artificial, ponds are abundant in wet regions where the ground is flat and impervious.  In literature and in the world of imagination, ponds are often associated with labyrinths, swamps and mists or fog.  In Quebec, the word étang or pond refers to certain entities such as lakes, waterways, and canals.  Farms often had ponds for fire protection.  Ponds can result from a wide range of natural processes, although in many parts of the world these are now severely constrained by human activity.  Any depression in the ground that collects and retains a sufficient amount of precipitation can be considered a pond, and such depressions can be formed by a variety of geological and ecological events.  In origin, pond is a variant form of the word pound, meaning a confining enclosure.  As straying cows are enclosed in a pound, so water is enclosed in a pond.  In earlier times, ponds were man-made and utilitarian; such as stew ponds, mill ponds, settling ponds and so on.^[1]