Lake Pend Oreille

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Garfield Bay on Lake Pend Oreille.

Lake Pend Oreille is a lake in northern Idaho, with an area of 148 square miles. It is 65 miles long, and 1,150 feet deep in some regions (5th in the US). It is one of the deepest lakes in the world. It is fed by the Clark Fork River and the Pack River, and drains via the Pend Oreille River. It is surrounded by national forests and many small towns. All but the southern tip of the lake is in Bonner County, the southern tip which is home to Farragut State Park, the original home of the Farragut Naval Training Station, and the home of the NAVSEA's Naval Surface Warfare Center Carderock Division's Acoustic Research Detachment (ARD) is in Kootenai County.

The lake is home to many species of fish including: rainbow trout, lake trout, perch, crappie, bass, whitefish and kamloops. The forests are known to have various pines, such as ponderosa pine, Douglas fir, poplar and western larch. Whitetail deer, squirrels, black bears, coyotes and bobcats are known to reside in these forests. Bald Eagles, osprey, owls, hummingbirds, hawks, woodpeckers, ducks and the mountain bluebird are seen in the skies around the lake.

[edit] Geology

For more information on the geology of the Lake Pend Oreille see http://imnh.isu.edu/digitalatlas/counties/bonner/geomap.htm and http://imnh.isu.edu/digitalatlas/counties/kootenai/geomap.htm .

[edit] History

Lake Pend Oreille was glacially formed during the ice age. It is also believed that the eastern side of the lake was in the path of the ancient Missoula Flood.

The trading post Kullyspell House was built on Lake Pend Oreille by Finan McDonald in 1809.

During World War II, the south end of Lake Pend Oreille was the second largest naval training ground in the United States. Built as a direct result of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the training station is now Farragut State Park. The lake is still used to test large-scale submarine prototypes: the depth gives it acoustic properties similar to the open ocean, without the background noise of the ocean.