how to read lake coordinates?

[jat]

Hey all, I found some lakes in the MNR regs that I want to try and they have their location in latitutde and Longitue but I don't know how to read this info to find out where the lake is.

 

For example:

 

 

(44º 59' N., 78º 10' W.)

 

how the heck can I find where this is without a gps unit? Is there some way to google this location?

Thanks

[irishfield]

Use Google Earth and just plug in the coordinates... it'll take you there !

[jat]

how accurate is it?

[walleyejigger]

unfortunately those coordinates are pretty vague

 

according to my GPS it would be or near Adams Lake south of Hwy 121 between Tory Hill and Cheddar

[irishfield]

how accurate is it?

 

extremely if you had the "seconds" of the coords and not just degrees and minutes.

[kingjames_2nd]

One option if you are having trouble finding your lake because the search engine doesnt recognize the format is to change the format of the coordinate.

 

To convert lat and long from degrees, minutes and seconds go to this link here : http://www.fcc.gov/mb/audio/bickel/DDDMMSS-decimal.html

 

here I pluged in (44º 59' N., 78º 10' W.) and it converted it into decimal degrees: 44.983333n 78.166667w

 

Off to google maps ( maps.google.com) where I searched my newly converted coordinates and the following result was returned... HERE!

 

 

As-to accuracy, google is very accurate though I can't quote exact numbers. I have searched alot of the small stocked lakes in the regs manual and am often dismayed at the coordinate that google gives me. The error isn't on the google end but on the MNR end. If the latitude and longitude do not give accuracy down to the second then there is a large window for error left open.

 

There are approx. 111 km per degree of latitude, approx 1.8 km per minute and 30 meters per second. Longitude is variable depending on what latitude it is being measured at. So I basically spewed all that technical jargon to say that if the coordinate is off a couple of minutes, or rounded up or down the coordinate may not be all that useful. Especially when looking for a lake in the middle of 100 other lakes.

Edited February 20, 2008 by kingjames_2nd

[dannyboy]

The coordinates you posted don't include seconds ( " ) so they are accurate to about a mile, with seconds they would be accurate to about 100 feet.

GPS units use decimal seconds and are accurate to inches.

 

Dan

[jat]

you know what kills me is when I ask the MNR people about these stocked lakes and they don't even know where they are and of course they're not named on any google maps or fishing maps................what's the point of telling which lake is stocked?

[irishfield]

you know what kills me is when I ask the MNR people about these stocked lakes and they don't even know where they are and of course they're not named on any google maps or fishing maps................what's the point of telling which lake is stocked?

 

Go to a good book store/outdoor store and buy the 50,000 scale topo map for the area in question. Look at the border scales and find the lake the good old fashion way.