Little Turtle Lake

On the LakeGrade scale Little Turtle Lake grades a B, with clarity at 7.0 ft and 23 µg/L of phosphorus placing it above the Minnesota median. 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 near 49 places Little Turtle Lake in the mesotrophic band — moderate productivity, with seasonal swings between clearer spring water and richer late-summer conditions. The lake bottoms out at 25 ft — a moderate depth that supports a warm-water fishery without the year-round cold refuge a deeper basin provides. At 469 acres, Little Turtle Lake fits the Minnesota median for monitored lakes, with 5.6 miles of shoreline. Little Turtle Lake ranks 65 of 86 in Beltrami County — at the lower end of the locally monitored distribution.

Little Turtle Lake has no invasive species recorded in Minnesota state databases as of 2024, though prevention practices still apply at all access points. The fishery includes walleye alongside the lake's other 15 documented species — a notable draw for Minnesota anglers. No formal public access is documented at Little Turtle Lake — most use is by shoreline residents and their guests. Ice-out has been recorded 14 times at Little Turtle Lake, with a median around Apr 29. 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.