Hodag Lake

Hodag Lake sits at the top of the Wisconsin DNR grading rubric with an A, a mark reached by the cleanest lakes in Wisconsin. The three sub-grades — clarity, phosphorus, and chlorophyll-a — track close together, so no single parameter is dragging the average.

The lake's low TSI puts it in oligotrophic territory — the cleanest of the four trophic classes, but also the most vulnerable to nutrient-driven shifts. A maximum depth of 20 ft puts Hodag Lake in the middle of Wisconsin's depth distribution. At 16 acres, Hodag Lake sits below the Wisconsin median: a small water where shoreline activity has an outsized effect on water quality. Among the 140 graded lakes in Oneida County, Hodag Lake sits at rank 58, above the county median.

Hodag Lake has no invasive species recorded in Wisconsin state databases as of 2025, though prevention practices still apply at all access points. Bass fishing is part of the appeal: the species list runs to 3, anchored by largemouth and/or smallmouth bass. A documented public access point at Hodag Lake makes the lake usable for shore fishing, paddle craft, and trailered boats. 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.