Musser Lake

Musser Lake pulls a D on the LakeGrade rubric — phosphorus loading and limited clarity hold it below the Wisconsin average. 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.

Eutrophic conditions are the baseline here: clarity drops noticeably in late summer, and dissolved oxygen near the bottom can become a concern. The lake bottoms out at 15 ft — a moderate depth that supports a warm-water fishery without the year-round cold refuge a deeper basin provides. Musser Lake covers 503 acres alongside partial shoreline records — a mid-sized water that supports a working fishery without being so large that conditions diverge between basins. Within the 27 graded lakes of Price County, Musser Lake sits at rank 22, near the bottom of the county list.

Musser Lake carries an invasive watermilfoil record — boat-launch decontamination and shoreline care matter more here than at uninfested lakes. Walleye are documented at Musser Lake, one of 5 fish species on record for the lake. A documented public access point at Musser 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.