Duck Lake
Cayuga County, New YorkView mapDirections
NY DEC publishes the water-quality measurements for Duck Lake. Here is what has been measured.
- Impaired · Nutrients (phosphorus, nitrogen)
- 35 ft max depth
- Limited data
Duck Lake in Cayuga County, New York has water-quality measurements published by NY DEC, shown here as reported. Water clarity: 4.3 ft visibility.
Duck Lake is a lake in Cayuga County, New York with an estimated average depth of about 35 feet.
Source: EPA Water Quality Portal sampling records, NYSDEC, last sampled 2020-08-20. Methodology: how these readings are compared.
Swimming conditions
No readingRecreation use not supported
Nutrient and algae readings are not a swimming clearance. Duck Lake is listed impaired under Clean Water Act §303(d) (IR 5) for nutrients (phosphorus, nitrogen). Check local advisories before you swim.
Whether Duck Lake is safe to swim in today is a call for the New York Department of Environmental Conservation and the county health department, who post current advisories. LakeQuality does not issue swimming clearances.
Water quality measurements for Duck Lake
These are the measurements NY DEC publishes for Duck Lake, shown as reported. The condition class beside each reading is the EPA National Lakes Assessment class for this lake’s ecoregion.
Murky, only visible to about 4.3 ft. TSI 56.
| Measure | Reading | Where it sits |
|---|---|---|
| Water clarity (Secchi depth) | 4.3ft | Measured, not scored How deep a black-and-white disk stays visible from the surface. Higher is clearer. |
| Total phosphorus | No reading The nutrient that most limits algae growth in freshwater. More phosphorus, more algae potential. | |
| Chlorophyll-a (algae) | No reading The green pigment in algae — a direct measure of how much algae is in the water. | |
| Trophic state (TSI)Carlson's 0–100 index of how much algae a lake can support, from clarity, phosphorus and chlorophyll-a. | 56 | Eutrophic OligotrophicMesotrophicEutrophicHypereutrophic |
High nutrients, frequent algae, reduced clarity
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Answers come straight from the public measurements and survey records on this page.
Lake Details
Max depth
~35 ft est.
Depth marked “est.” is a modeled maximum from GLOBathy (Khazaei et al. 2022, CC0), not a measured survey. New York has not published bathymetry for Duck Lake.
Lake Size & Watershed
Watershed (drainage) area
11 sq mi
HydroLAKES / HydroSHEDS
Surface area
193 acres
HydroLAKES / HydroSHEDS
Shoreline
2.7 mi
HydroLAKES / HydroSHEDS
Elevation
394 ft
Size, shoreline, and watershed area from HydroLAKES (HydroSHEDS). Mean depth here is modelled, not surveyed — HydroLAKES v1.0 estimates lake depth from surrounding terrain rather than from soundings. Treat it as an approximation, and prefer a state bathymetric survey where one exists.
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Fishing Duck Lake
EPA Impairment Status
Duck Lake is officially listed as impaired under Clean Water Act §303(d) in the 2022 EPA reporting cycle (IR category 5).
Causes of impairment
Designated uses not supporting: Recreation.
Source: EPA ATTAINS assessment unit NY0704-0025 · Official waterbody report
Nearby Lakes in Cayuga County
Frequently asked questions about Duck Lake
Where is Duck Lake?
- Duck Lake is a lake in Cayuga County, New York. Its water-quality measurements are published by NY DEC and shown on this page as reported.
What is the water quality of Duck Lake?
- Duck Lake in Cayuga County, New York has water-quality measurements published by NY DEC, shown here as reported. Water clarity: 4.3 ft visibility.
Is Duck Lake safe to swim in?
- Nutrient and algae readings are not a swimming clearance. Duck Lake is listed impaired under Clean Water Act §303(d) (IR 5) for nutrients (phosphorus, nitrogen). Check local advisories before you swim.
How deep is Duck Lake?
- No published bathymetric survey covers Duck Lake, so its depth has not been measured. The HydroLAKES global model estimates an average depth of about 35 feet, but that is a modelled estimate derived from surrounding terrain rather than a measurement on the water, so treat it as approximate.
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Where this data comes from
6 measurements from 1 monitoring station, 2020. Retrieved from the EPA Water Quality Portal on 2026-08-02.
Collected and reported by
- North American Lake Management Society
NALMS6 samples · 2020
Monitoring station identifiers (1)
EPA condition classes from the National Lakes Assessment (EPA 841-R-24-006, Table 6-3), applied by ecoregion. See where the data comes from and data sources.
Other records on this page
Impairment status from EPA ATTAINS 303(d) database
Lake size & watershed from HydroLAKES (HydroSHEDS)