Bark Lake

Bark Lake earns a C — middle-of-the-pack water quality, with one or two parameters dragging the average down from a stronger grade. Sub-grades cluster within a single letter of each other, which usually means the lake is in stable trophic balance rather than fighting one specific stressor.

A TSI in the eutrophic range signals a lake doing what nutrient-loaded waters do — supporting an active algal community at the cost of clear water. Bark Lake reaches 34 ft at its deepest point — typical for Wisconsin mid-sized lakes, with seasonal stratification but limited cold-water refuge. Bark Lake is small — 65 acres alongside partial shoreline records — which makes it sensitive to even modest changes in watershed runoff or recreational pressure. Within the 15 graded lakes of Washington County, Bark Lake sits at rank 13, near the bottom of the county list.

Eurasian watermilfoil has been documented at Bark Lake, requiring shoreline management to keep dense mats from crowding native vegetation. Walleye are documented at Bark Lake, one of 4 fish species on record for the lake. Monitoring depth is thin here: the LakeGrade rubric is applied to a small number of sample years, and the grade will be revised as more data accumulates.