Kentucky reservoir · state assessment record
Rough River Lake
Assessment decisions reported by Kentucky to EPA under Clean Water Act sections 303(d) and 305(b), last assessed in the 2024 reporting cycle.
- 5,034
- Assessed acres
- Lake / Reservoir / Pond
- Water type
- Eutrophic
- Reported trophic class
- 95.0 ft
- Gage Height (provisional)
This waterbody in one line
Rough River Lake, a reservoir in Kentucky, is assessed as not supporting one or more designated uses, with one listed impairment cause in the state's most recent Integrated Report cycle (2024). By assessed acreage it sits among the largest 1% of assessed lakes nationally (38,628 lakes with a filed area); its impairment list is among the longest nationally (one listed cause vs 23,610 assessed lakes). Aquatic life is assessed as fully supporting. Fish consumption is assessed as not supporting. A USGS gauge tracks its gage height daily.
- Not Supporting
- overall status
- P99
- Assessed size nationally
- P20
- Shorter cause list
- Fully Supporting
- aquatic life
Assessment verdicts are the state agency's decisions as reported to EPA ATTAINS; PlainLakes renders them without modification.
A composite of this record's EPA ATTAINS designated-use verdicts, filed impairment count, and assessment currency, weighted and benchmarked against the national corpus of assessed active waterbodies. This is a water-quality standing, not a human-recreation or property-value judgment, and dimensions with no filed verdict drop out rather than count against the score.
Reading Rough River Lake's filed record
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 Rough River Lake nationally is assessed size: 5,034 acres, larger than 99% of the 38,628 lake-type units with an area on file.
The uses disagree
This record splits: Not Supporting on fish consumption, Fully Supporting on recreation, aquatic life. The divergence is inside the designated-use matrix, not a single all-or-nothing label.
Rough River Lake: Category 5, TMDL still owed
Category 5 is the Integrated Report band where a TMDL (or equivalent) is still expected for Rough River Lake. Read the listed causes and any cleanup actions filed beside them before treating the overall status tile as a finished restoration story.
Overall status: not supporting
The filer's overall status for Rough River Lake is Not Supporting. That tile summarizes the assessment unit; the designated-use rows and cause list are the evidence behind it.
Typical cause-list length
1 listed cause is a middle-tercile list length among assessed lake-type units. Look to IR category and use outcomes for the distinctive reading.
According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's ATTAINS program, Kentucky carries 141 filed lake-type waterbodies in the August 2026 extract, and this page renders the assessment record EPA assigned to Rough River Lake 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 |
|---|---|---|
| Domestic Water Supply | Drinking-water supply designation | Fully Supporting |
| Fish Consumption | Fish-consumption or fishery | Not Supporting |
| Primary Contact Recreation Water | Recreation | Fully Supporting |
| Secondary Contact Recreation Water | Recreation | Fully Supporting |
| Warm Water Aquatic Habitat | Aquatic-life or related | Fully Supporting |
The record
Listed impairment causes
Causes the state listed as impairing designated uses of this reservoir, with the cycle each was first listed and the Clean Water Act action recorded against it.
| Cause | Affected uses | First listed | Cleanup standing |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mercury in Fish Tissue | Fish Consumption | 2008 | TMDL priority: Low |
Reading the record
Where Rough River Lake sits among peers
4 of 6 Kentucky lakes assessed this deeply also came out mixed
Kentucky ruled definitively on 5 designated uses at Rough River Lake and found 1 of 5 not supported. The dataset shows 6 Kentucky lakes judged to that same depth.
Kentucky's assessed lakes are most often judged on 2 uses; this one was judged on 5.
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5+ | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| All supported | 21 | 16 | 13 | 5 | 2 |
| Mixed | Not possible | 26 | 15 | 7 | 4 (this record) |
| None supported | 14 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Ringed cell: Rough River Lake. Source: EPA ATTAINS, Reporting cycles 1987–2026.
Scale and rank
Rough River Lake is one of 141 lake-type waterbodies reported to EPA from Kentucky, and one of 108 whose reported record carries enough populated assessment or gauge data for this site to list and index it. At 5,034 assessed acres it ranks 612th 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 611 lakes with a larger one.
Water level
A USGS gauge tracks this reservoir's gage height daily, and the latest reading is 11.95 ft below the reading 32 days earlier, against a 365-day observed range of 37.1 ft.
Reported trophic class
Eutrophic 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.
Water level: 365-day record
Daily gage height values, feet above this gauge’s own local zero, not above sea level, from USGS gauge 03318005 (Rough River Lake Near Falls of Rough, Ky), shown weekly. Readings are daily-batch snapshots, not real-time conditions.
- Latest reading
- 95.0 ft 11.949999999999989ft vs 32 days earlier
- 2026-08-15 · Provisional, subject to USGS revision
Water level: 365-day record
Subscribe to water level updates for Rough River Lake (RSS)
Every daily value in this window is provisional and subject to USGS revision: USGS has not yet approved any value in the trailing 365 days of this record.
Full gauge record: USGS monitoring location 03318005
In context
Where Rough River Lake 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
5,034 Top 1% larger than 99% 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
Listed causes vs waterbodies carrying a verdict
How many impairment causes U.S. waterbodies with a reported verdict carry
1 Longer than most more listed causes than 49% of 23,610 waterbodies carrying a verdict
named waterbodies carrying a verdict, 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 Rough River Lake. Hover or tap any bar for its full count and share.
In context
Kentucky context
ATTAINS carries 141 lake-type waterbodies in Kentucky, 72 assessed as not supporting at least one use and 57 fully supporting. Among the 108 indexed units there, Rough River Lake ranks 30th by listed-cause count (one listed cause) and 9th by assessed size among the 108 with an area filed; it sits in the not-supporting set (72 statewide) . Its listed causes include Mercury in Fish Tissue, which also appears among Kentucky's most-filed impairment causes (led by Nutrient/Eutrophication Biological Indicators).
| Other large assessed lakes in Kentucky | Assessed acres |
|---|---|
| Lake Cumberland Not Supporting | 50,611 |
| Kentucky Lake Not Supporting | 48,725 |
| Lake Barkley Not Supporting | 39,298 |
| Barren River Lake Not Supporting | 9,461 |
| Green River Lake Fully Supporting | 8,438 |
| Cave Run Lake Not Supporting | 8,097 |
Peers near Rough River Lake's size or cause load
Similar assessed acres
Nearest filed extents (5,034 acres here).
- Lake Iamonia · 5,035 acres · FL
- Cobbosseecontee Stream · 5,036 acres · ME
- Tenkiller Ferry Lake, Illinois River Arm · 5,032 acres · OK
- HIWASSEE RIVER (Hiwassee Lake below elevation 1525) · 5,030 acres · NC
Similar cause load
Nearest listed-cause counts (1 here). Peers already in the acreage column are omitted.
- Aaron · 1 causes · MN
- Aaron River Reservoir · 1 causes · MA
- Abbotts Creek (including Lexington-Thomasville Water Supply Reservoir at normal reservoir elevation, Tom-A-Lex Lake) · 1 causes · NC
- Abeniki Lake · 1 causes · NH
What to do with this record
- The fish-consumption use is assessed as not supporting. Before eating fish from this reservoir, check your state fish-advisory program for species-specific meal limits. Consumption status guide
- Water levels shown are daily snapshots. Seasonal drawdown and datum conventions matter when comparing levels. How to read level data
- 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 KY-1645. 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.