Yellow Birch Lake

Yellow Birch Lake earns an A — water clarity, phosphorus, and chlorophyll-a all rate among the best monitored waters in Vilas County. The three sub-grades — clarity, phosphorus, and chlorophyll-a — track close together, so no single parameter is dragging the average.

Trophically, Yellow Birch Lake reads as oligotrophic — nutrient-poor, clear, and ecologically more sensitive to disturbance than richer lakes. The lake bottoms out at 23 ft — a moderate depth that supports a warm-water fishery without the year-round cold refuge a deeper basin provides. The lake's 192 acres and partial shoreline records put it in the mid-range bucket — large enough for varied use, small enough that watershed inputs reach the whole basin. Yellow Birch Lake ranks 58 of 202 in Vilas County — solidly in the upper half of the local distribution.

Eurasian watermilfoil is established at Yellow Birch Lake, which can dampen recreational access and pressure the native plant community. Walleye are documented at Yellow Birch Lake, one of 6 fish species on record for the lake. Public access is available — the lake is on the Wisconsin DNR public-access list. 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.