Abstract
The purpose of this study is to evaluate the trophic state of five lakes in southern Yellowstone National Park in order to determine if the human activity in the local area is having a negative environmental impact and possibly increasing the eutrophication rate. While some previous analyses have been done on these lakes, this study is intended to be a preliminary trophic state evaluation to which future analyses can be compared. The five lakes sampled are Shoshone Lake, Lewis Lake, Heart Lake, Riddle Lake, and Duck Lake. Each lake, with the exceptions of Riddle Lake and Duck Lake, was sampled at several locations. These samples were taken during the months of June through August of 1999 by Woodruff Miller and Dave Anderson of the BYU Civil & Environmental Engineering Department.