The Lacustrine States

The United States is home to nearly 3.25 million lakes, which is surprisingly similar in number to the 3.8 million square miles of total area that the United States occupies.  This would suggest that, on average, there is nearly 1 lake for each square mile!

That is only the average, however — there are vast expanses of desert in the United States that certainly do not have a grid of lakes, each a mile apart.  Additionally, the fact that large areas of land have a much lower density of lakes than the average density means that large areas of land will consequently have a much higher density of lakes than the average density.

For this reason, I became interested in seeing a list of the states ranked by the number of lakes they occupy.

It is worth noting that the number of lakes for each state would be lower if we only considered natural lakes, but I couldn’t find a source that specified how many natural lakes were in each state.  I did manage to find out that Maryland is the only state that does not own a single natural lake — all of Maryland’s lakes are manmade.

Here are some lists that rank each state by their number of lakes; keep in mind that this includes natural lakes, manmade lakes, reservoirs, and small ponds — the vast majority of Kansas’ lakes are privately-owned ponds.

States by Total Lakes

States by Lakes per Square Mile

Rank	State	Lakes per Sq. Mi.
1	Alaska	4.5
2	Kansas	1.5
3	Connecticut	.36
4	Massachusetts	.28
5	Wisconsin	.23
6	Minnesota	.17
7	Rhode Island	.15
8	New York	.14
9	Florida	.12
10	Michigan	.11
11	Washington	.11
12	New Hampshire	.09
13	Vermont	.08
14	Maine	.08
15	South Carolina	.07
16	Delaware	.06
17	Illinois	.05
18	New Jersey	.04
19	Arkansas	.04
20	Wyoming	.04
21	Pennsylvania	.04
22	Indiana	.04
23	Colorado	.04
24	Maryland	.04
25	Virginia	.04
26	Tennessee	.03
27	Louisiana	.03
28	Texas	.02
29	Hawaii	.02
30	Idaho	.02
31	Montana	.02
32	Utah	.02
33	Nebraska	.02
34	California	.02
35	Georgia	.01
36	Oregon	.01
37	New Mexico	.01
38	North Dakota	.01
39	West Virginia	.004
40	Iowa	.002
41	Mississippi	.002
42	Ohio	.002
43	South Dakota	.002
44	Missouri	.001
45	Arizona	.001
46	Kentucky	.001
47	North Carolina	.001
48	Oklahoma	.001
49	Alabama	.001
50	Nevada	.0003

States by Lakes per 10,000 People:

Rank	State	Lakes per 10,000 People
1	Alaska	40,336
2	Kansas	401
3	Wyoming	68
4	Montana	30
5	Wisconsin	25
6	Minnesota	25
7	Maine	19
8	Vermont	12
9	Michigan	11
10	Washington	10
11	Idaho	10
12	Arkansas	7.5
13	Nebraska	7.4
14	Colorado	6.7
15	New Hampshire	5.7
16	New Mexico	5.6
17	Connecticut	5.4
18	Utah	5.2
19	North Dakota	5.0
20	Massachusetts	4.2
21	New York	4.0
22	South Carolina	3.9
23	Louisiana	3.6
24	Oregon	3.3
25	Florida	3.2
26	Illinois	2.3
27	Texas	2.2
28	Rhode Island	2.1
29	Indiana	2.1
30	Tennessee	1.9
31	Hawaii	1.8
32	Virginia	1.7
33	Pennsylvania	1.4
34	South Dakota	1.4
35	Delaware	1.3
36	Georgia	.76
37	California	.76
38	Maryland	.71
39	West Virginia	.57
40	Iowa	.43
41	New Jersey	.42
42	Mississippi	.40
43	Arizona	.17
44	Missouri	.16
45	Oklahoma	.15
46	Nevada	.11
47	Kentucky	.10
48	Ohio	.09
49	Alabama	.06
50	North Carolina	.05

I was quite surprised to see that Alaska has 3 million lakes!  This means that Alaska alone owns 93% of America’s lakes!

What do you think about the lakes of the United States?

Onward American 🇺🇸

Source: Lakes by State