Cowley Lake

Cowley Lake earns an F: 739 µg/L of phosphorus and clarity at 0.8 ft signal heavy nutrient loading from the surrounding watershed. 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.

Hypereutrophic conditions mean the lake is operating at the upper end of the productivity scale, with all the bloom risk that implies. The lake's maximum depth is not yet documented in state morphometric records — context for its physical structure remains limited. The lake's surface area is not consistently recorded across state datasets — physical context remains partial. Within the 95 graded lakes of Hennepin County, Cowley Lake sits at rank 92, near the bottom of the county list.

Cowley Lake has no invasive species recorded in Minnesota state databases as of 2023, though prevention practices still apply at all access points. The state fisheries records do not list documented species for Cowley Lake, which usually reflects a lack of formal fisheries survey work rather than an empty lake. The lake lacks a documented public access point, so visitor use is limited. 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.