lakedates.com

Minnesota · USACE St. Paul District (Red Lake Dam)

Lower Red Lake water level

Today's reading against full pool and Lower Red Lake's own seasonal history.

Searched “Lower Red lake level” or “lake level for Lower Red Lake”? Same lake, same reading — you're in the right place. The current reading is right here too, whether you typed “current Lower Red Lake water level” or “current water level at Lower Red Lake”.

FULL POOL 1170 1172 1174 1176
Elevation, feet (project datum)

as of October 1, 2026

1173.71 ft project datum

level 0.8 ft below full pool — on the low side for early October

Reading comes straight from U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Access to Water data (USACE lake gauge) and updates live when you load this page.

Is Lower Red Lake full?

Not quite — 0.8 ft below full pool as of October 1, 2026

How full is Lower Red Lake? Not as a percentage: no storage figure comes through with this gauge reading, and a share of capacity worked out from the elevation alone would be a guess — how much water a reservoir holds at a given level is a curve only the operator's own capacity table knows. Feet from full pool is what the operator publishes, and it is the figure above.

Lower Red Lake through the year

The band is the lake's own normal: where the level has run on each calendar day, 2014–2026. The summer drawdown — and how this year sits in it — shows up without reading a single number.

full pool 1173 1174 1175 1176 JFMAMJJASOND
Median and normal range by day of year, 2014–2026 · elevation, feet (project datum)

This year vs the years that matter

This year's trace against last year and the driest and wettest years on record — the drought-context question every lake regular asks.

full pool 1173 1174 1175 1176 JFMAMJJASOND
  • 2026 (this year)
  • 2025 (last year)
  • 2020 (wettest on record)
  • 2018 (driest on record)

Full pool, datum, and the gauge

"Full pool" here means the conservation pool — the level the lake is designed to hold for water supply and recreation, not the flood-control space above it. The full explainer covers flood pool and dead pool too.

Full pool 1174.50 ft project datum · per USACE St. Paul District (Red Lake Dam) full-pool reference
Conservation capacity 1,955,003 acre-feet · per USACE St. Paul District (Red Lake Dam) capacity reference
Gauge USACE lake gauge · U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Access to Water data
Datum project datum — The district publishes the gauge and the top of normal pool figure in the project's own datum, so the two compare like for like.
Last verified August 20, 2026

LakeDates reports lake level, not ramp status. Whether a given ramp or marina is usable at this level varies ramp by ramp — call the marina before you tow.

Quick answers

What is the lake level for Lower Red Lake today?

Lower Red Lake is at 1173.71 ft (project datum) as of October 1, 2026 — 0.8 ft below full pool — on the low side for early October.

Is Lower Red Lake full?

Not quite — at 1173.71 ft on October 1, 2026, Lower Red Lake is 0.8 ft below its full pool of 1174.50 ft (project datum).

How full is Lower Red Lake?

Not as a percentage: no storage figure comes through with this gauge reading, and a share of capacity worked out from the elevation alone would be a guess — how much water a reservoir holds at a given level is a curve only the operator's own capacity table knows. Feet from full pool is what the operator publishes, and it is the figure above.

What is full pool for Lower Red Lake?

Full pool (the conservation pool) for Lower Red Lake is 1174.50 ft project datum, per USACE St. Paul District (Red Lake Dam) full-pool reference. Levels above it use flood storage; levels below it are drawdown.