Pelican Lake

Pelican Lake sits at a C on the grading scale — not impaired, not pristine, with summer measurements that vary year to year. With clarity and phosphorus scored, the sub-grades cluster within a letter of each other, pointing to stable conditions rather than one specific stressor.

A TSI in the eutrophic range signals a lake doing what nutrient-loaded waters do — supporting an active algal community at the cost of clear water. The lake bottoms out at 34 ft — a moderate depth that supports a warm-water fishery without the year-round cold refuge a deeper basin provides. The lake's 518 acres and 5.4 miles of shoreline put it in the mid-range bucket — large enough for varied use, small enough that watershed inputs reach the whole basin. Pelican Lake ranks 10 of 25 in Pope County — solidly in the upper half of the local distribution.

Pelican Lake is on the Minnesota infested-waters list for zebra mussels — boaters should follow clean-drain-dry protocols when moving gear to or from the lake. Walleye are documented at Pelican Lake, one of 18 fish species on record for the lake. A documented public access point at Pelican Lake makes the lake usable for shore fishing, paddle craft, and trailered boats. The lake has a partial ice record — 18 observed ice-outs, centered near Apr 6. 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.