The oldest lakes on earth, ranging in age from 130,000 years to many millions of years.

The map was sourced from this research paper:

Hampton, Stephanie & Mcgowan, Suzanne & Ozersky, Ted & Virdis, Salvatore & Vu, Tuong-Thuy & Spanbauer, Trisha & Kraemer, Benjamin & Swann, George & Mackay, Anson & Powers, Stephen & Meyer, Michael & Labou, Stephanie & Oreilly, Catherine & DiCarlo, Morgan & Galloway, Aaron & Fritz, Sherilyn. (2018). Recent ecological change in ancient lakes. Limnology and Oceanography. 63. 10.1002/lno.10938.

  • kersploosh@lemmy.worldOP
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    9 months ago

    The research paper doesn’t get into that detail in their definition of “lake,” but the authors do seem okay with including lakes that occasionally dry up. They mention in the paper that, “Lake Victoria, presently the world’s largest tropical lake, desiccated during the late Pleistocene (Stager et al. 2011).”