Illinois lake · state assessment record
Fish Trap
The assessment record reported by Illinois to EPA under Clean Water Act sections 303(d) and 305(b), filed in the 2004 reporting cycle.
- 285
- Assessed acres
- Lake, Freshwater
- Water type
- Hypereutrophic
- Reported trophic class
This waterbody in one line
Fish Trap, a lake in Illinois, was reported but not assessed in the state's most recent Integrated Report cycle (2004). By assessed acreage it sits in the upper quartile by assessed acreage nationally (38,628 lakes).
- Not Assessed
- overall status
- P86
- Assessed size nationally
Assessment verdicts are the state agency's decisions as reported to EPA ATTAINS; PlainLakes renders them without modification.
Where Fish Trap stands in the filed register
Paragraphs are selected by this unit's percentiles and use matrix: different lakes lead with different dimensions. Figures are ATTAINS / portal register arithmetic, not advice.
The signature stat: assessed size
The number that most separates Fish Trap nationally is assessed size: 285 acres, larger than 86% of the 38,628 lake-type units with an area on file.
IR category 3 on Fish Trap
The Integrated Report category filed for Fish Trap is 3. PlainLakes renders EPA's code without remapping it into a consumer grade.
Overall status: Not Assessed
ATTAINS overall status on this unit is “Not Assessed”. PlainLakes does not rewrite that vocabulary into a consumer score.
According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's ATTAINS program, Illinois carries 783 filed lake-type waterbodies in the August 2026 extract, and this page renders the assessment record EPA assigned to Fish Trap without modification. See our methodology for reporting-unit limits and gauge linking rules.
The record
Designated-use assessments
Fully Supporting and Not Supporting are the state's definitive verdicts; other entries mean the use was not conclusively assessed in this cycle.
| Designated use | Group | Verdict |
|---|---|---|
| Aesthetic Quality | Other | Not Assessed |
| Aquatic Life | Aquatic-life or related | Not Assessed |
| Fish Consumption | Fish-consumption or fishery | Not Assessed |
| Primary Contact | Recreation | Not Assessed |
The record
Listed impairment causes
The state reported this lake in its 2004 Integrated Report cycle but reached no assessment determination, so no causes are listed. The unit is recorded under EPA integrated-reporting Category 3: reviewed, with insufficient information to determine whether it meets water-quality standards. An undetermined waterbody is neither confirmed clean nor confirmed impaired.
Reading the record
What Fish Trap's record holds
Scale and rank
Fish Trap is one of 783 lake-type waterbodies reported to EPA from Illinois. It is not among the 439 whose reported record carries enough populated assessment or gauge data for this site to list and index it. At 285 assessed acres it ranks 5,574th by assessed size among the 38,628 lakes the dataset carries an area for, counting a state’s repeated filings of one water once, behind 5,573 lakes with a larger one.
What this record holds
Illinois filed this lake in its 2004 Integrated Report cycle but reached no determination, so the record holds that filing and its use rows, but no verdict, and with nothing judged, no impairment cause to track over time. The state has not yet filed a definitive fish-consumption verdict, a definitive recreation verdict, a definitive aquatic-life verdict, and 1 other for this record; those fields populate when it reports them in a future Integrated Report cycle.
Reported trophic class
Hypereutrophic is the trophic class the filing agency reported to EPA ATTAINS for this assessment unit. It describes nutrient enrichment, not whether the water is safe, and it is not a PlainLakes inference. What the trophic scale measures.
In context
Where Fish Trap sits nationally
Assessed size among U.S. lakes
Distribution of assessed acreage across ATTAINS lakes filed with an area, counting a state’s repeated filings of one water once
285 Top 14% larger than 86% of 38,628 lakes
lakes the dataset carries an area for, counting a state’s repeated filings of one water once, bucketed by value
Source EPA ATTAINS · Reporting cycles 1987–2026
In both charts each bar is a band and taller bars hold more waterbodies; the dashed line and filled bar mark Fish Trap. Hover or tap any bar for its full count and share.
In context
Illinois context
ATTAINS carries 783 lake-type waterbodies in Illinois, 434 assessed as not supporting at least one use and 63 fully supporting.
| Other large assessed lakes in Illinois | Assessed acres |
|---|---|
| Lake Michigan Nearshore Not Supporting | 125,440 |
| Carlyle Not Supporting | 24,580 |
| Rend Not Supporting | 18,900 |
| Shelbyville Not Supporting | 11,000 |
| Crab Orchard Not Supporting | 6,965 |
| Clinton Not Supporting | 4,895 |
Lakes near Fish Trap's assessed acres
Similar assessed acres
Nearest filed extents (285 acres here).
- Great South Pond · 285 acres · MA
- Rutledge Lake · 285 acres · GA
- Wolf · 285 acres · MN
- Brooks Lake · 285 acres · MI
What to do with this record
- Assessment verdicts are cycle-based, not real-time. For fish-consumption decisions, your state advisory program is the binding source. Consumption status guide
- Impairment listings follow the Clean Water Act 303(d) process; a listing is a regulatory finding, not a closure notice. 303(d) explained
PlainLakes renders state assessment decisions and federal gauge observations without modification. It does not issue advisories.
Assessment decisions on this page are rendered directly from state Integrated Report records in EPA's ATTAINS system; gauge figures are daily-value observations from the USGS National Water Information System, no number is typed in by an editor. Overall status, use verdicts, and causes are the state's reported decisions for assessment unit IL_RMF. Counts and percentiles are computed across all lake-type records PlainLakes ingests from ATTAINS. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of 2026-08-17. Primary sources: EPA ATTAINS and USGS National Water Information System.