What is Lake?
[[File:Bariloche-_Argentina2.jpg|thumb|A lake in [[Bariloche]], [[Argentina]]]] [[File:A lake in the Andes Mountains.jpeg|thumb|right|A lake in the [[Andes|Andes Mountains]]]] [[File:Glenridding, Cumbria, England - June 2009.jpg|thumb|A lake in the [[Lake District]], [[Cumbria]], [[England]]]] A '''lake''' (from [[Latin language|Latin]]: ''lacus'') is a large body of water (larger and deeper than a [[pond]]) within a body of land. As a lake is separated from the [[ocean]], it is not a [[sea]]. Some lakes are very big, and people in the past sometimes called them seas. Lakes do not [[Flux|flow]] like [[river]]s, but many have rivers flowing into and out of them. Most lakes on the surface of the [[Earth]] are [[fresh water]] and most are in the [[Northern Hemisphere]]. More than 60% of the lakes of the world are in [[Canada]]. [[Finland]] is known as ''The Land of the Thousand Lakes'' (there are 187,888 lakes in Finland, of which 60,000 are large).<ref>[http://www.stat.fi/index_en.html Statistics Finland]</ref> Many lakes are man-made [[reservoir]]s built to produce [[electricity]], for [[recreation]], or to use the water for [[irrigation]] or [[industry]], or in [[house]]s. If there are not rivers flowing out of the lake (see [[Endorheic basin]]), or they are few and small, the lake loses water only by [[evaporation]] or because the water flows through the [[soil]] [[pore]]s. Where the water evaporates rapidly and the soil around the lake has a high [[salt]] level, as in very dry places, the water of the lake has a high [[concentration]] of salt and the lake is called a '''[[salt lake]]'''. Examples of salt lakes are the [[Great Salt Lake]], the [[Caspian Sea]], the [[Aral Sea]], and the [[Dead Sea]]. == Largest lakes by continent == * '''Africa''' - [[Lake Victoria]], also the second largest freshwater lake on Earth. It is one of the [[African Great Lakes|Great Lakes of Africa]]. * '''Antarctica''' - [[Lake Vostok]]. * '''Asia''' - [[Lake Baikal]] is the largest lake that is completely in Asia. The [[Caspia