What is the cleanest lake in Cook County, Illinois?

Lake Calumet in Cook County has the cleanest nutrient and algae readings in Cook County, Illinois, with 4.1 feet of measured water clarity.

How are these rankings calculated?

Nutrients and algae, total phosphorus, nitrogen, chlorophyll-a and turbidity, are read against EPA National Lakes Assessment 2022 condition classes for that lake’s ecoregion. Water clarity (Secchi depth) is measured and shown separately. Lakes without enough recent samples are listed without a condition class rather than ranked low. Source data comes from the EPA Water Quality Portal.

Cleanest Lakes in Cook County, Illinois

Lake Calumet in Cook County leads the rankings on measured clarity and nutrients and 4.1 ft of clarity. Below are the top 15 cleanest monitored lakes in Cook County, Illinois, ranked on EPA nutrient and algae measurements.

Ranked List

#	Lake	County	Clarity	Phosphorus	Algae
1	Lake Calumet	Cook	4.1 ft	16.5 µg/L	5.4 µg/L
2	Big Bend Lake	Cook	-	-	-
3	Beck Lake	Cook	-	-	-
4	Spring Lake	Cook	-	-	-
5	Hawley Lake	Cook	-	-	-
6	Keene Lake	Cook	-	-	-
7	Hawthorn Lake	Cook	-	-	-
8	Baker Lake	Cook	-	-	-
9	Goose Lake	Cook	-	-	-
10	Tampier Slough	Cook	-	-	-
11	Longjohn Slough	Cook	-	-	-
12	Orland Lake	Cook	-	-	-
13	Lake Cottage Grove	Cook	-	-	-
14	Dead Stick Pond	Cook	-	-	-
15	Wolf Lake	Cook	-	-	-

Ranked List

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