Lower Bottle Lake

On the LakeGrade rubric, Lower Bottle Lake pulls an A: clarity at 15.0 ft and 10 µg/L of phosphorus put it in the top bracket for Minnesota. 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. At 110 ft of maximum depth, Lower Bottle Lake stratifies reliably through the summer — the hypolimnion stays cooler and clearer than the surface layer suggests. At 641 acres, Lower Bottle Lake fits the Minnesota median for monitored lakes, with 6.0 miles of shoreline. Lower Bottle Lake ranks 6 of 77 in Hubbard County, putting it in the upper tier of locally monitored lakes.

An invasive species record — faucet snail — has been logged at Lower Bottle Lake; Minnesota PCA maintains the official infested-waters list. The fishery includes walleye alongside the lake's other 13 documented species — a notable draw for Minnesota anglers. No formal public access is documented at Lower Bottle Lake — most use is by shoreline residents and their guests. The lake has a partial ice record — 17 observed ice-outs, centered near Apr 17. 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.