Sudbury man finds ice pancakes on area lake

Doug Jodouin was recently out shooting a video for his outdoor YouTubepagewhen he came across an unusual site: hundreds of circular pieces of ice, called ice pancakes, in the Wanapitei River.

"It's just the most odd looking pieces of ice," he said.

"They're hard to explain but they look like a pancake. I mean, that is the best way to describe them."

According to Environment Canada, pancake ice is "predominantly circular pieces of ice" with "raised rims due to the pieces striking against one another." They vary in size between 30 cm and 3 metres.

He says though ice is in the name, they're actually created by the foam that freezes on top of rivers.

"They look like they'd be solid heavy ice," Jodouin said.

"But they're actually not. If you were to pick them up, they're very light and they're very mushy."