Okabena Lake

Lake Okabena (also called Okabena Lake) is a shallow glacial lake in Nobles County in southwestern Minnesota. It lies entirely within the city limits of Worthington. It covers 776 acres and is about 1.25 miles long and 1 mile wide, with 5.5 miles of shoreline, an average depth of 6.9 feet and a maximum depth of 15.3 feet. Its depth was kept up by dredging until 1985. The lake drains more than 14,000 acres, mostly row-crop farmland and part of Worthington, a watershed-to-lake ratio of 19 to 1. The name means "home of the heron" in the Sioux language. A second lake, East Okabena, was drained in the late 1800s. Whiskey Ditch, paid for by a town "whiskey tax," was dug during a drought to send runoff into the lake that had been flowing north through Okabena Creek toward Heron Lake.

Most of the shoreline is owned by the City of Worthington. Public water access sites are on the north, south, east and west shores. Sailboard Beach, a city park on the site of a former power plant, holds a yearly sailboard race and music festival. The low shoreline and frequent wind make the lake well suited to windsurfing.

The Minnesota DNR manages the lake mainly for walleye. Yellow perch, largemouth bass, bluegill and crappie are secondary species. The Southwest Minnesota Fishing Club helps by raising young fish in ponds connected to the lake through Whiskey Ditch.