The river has its source in a number of small brooks which flow from the sandy pine woods of what is now the Camp Aldershot military base, near Steam Mill Village.

The Canard River has a short length of 15 km but its lower reaches are wide and deep due to the enormous tides of the Minas Basin.

The Canard river was known to the Mi'kmaq people as Apocheechumochwakade meaning "home of the black duck".

[1] Acadians settled along the river in the late 1600s and called it Rivière-aux-Canards after the French word for duck.

Known as the Grand Dyke it located where the current highway Route 358 crosses the river.

On October 27, 1755 fourteen transport ships embarked 1,600 Acadians from the region of Grand-Pré and Rivière-aux-Canards, as well as 1,300 from Pisiguit and Cobequid.