Deer Creek - North of Island

Deer Creek Reservoir's North of Island diving area in Wasatch County, Utah, provides freshwater divers with some of the consistently clearest water available in Utah's mountain reservoir diving scene—a site where the Deer Creek impoundment's well-managed water quality and the Wasatch Mountain setting combine to create a freshwater dive experience that regularly surprises divers accustomed to accepting turbid conditions as the freshwater norm. Deer Creek Reservoir sits in the canyon of the Provo River between the Wasatch Front peaks above Heber City and the Spanish Fork canyon downstream, its blue water visible from the highway as one of Utah Valley's most attractive bodies of water. The North of Island area takes its name from the small island feature within the reservoir that serves as the navigational reference for this particular diving zone. The island creates a sheltered diving area on its northern side where prevailing winds create less surface chop and where the bottom character and depth profile create conditions suitable for beginning divers developing their reservoir freshwater skills. The bottom near the island includes both sandy and rocky sections that provide varied habitat and the small-scale topographic variation that makes underwater navigation and exploration more interesting than featureless flat-bottom lake diving. Visibility at Deer Creek is one of the site's primary appeals—the reservoir typically maintains clarity in the range of fifteen to twenty-five feet or better in optimal conditions, usually in late summer and fall when algal growth subsides after the summer peak and the water column stabilizes. This clarity is exceptional by Utah freshwater standards and competitive with many of the Midwest's celebrated quarry dive sites. The ability to see the bottom clearly from above before descending, and to maintain visual orientation throughout the dive, transforms the experience from the close-contact navigation of turbid-water diving into the open-spatial awareness that Deer Creek allows. Fish life at Deer Creek reflects the Provo River system's cold-water fishery. Brown trout and rainbow trout are stocked in the reservoir and provide the premium fish encounter that Utah freshwater diving can offer—large, beautiful fish visible in Deer Creek's clear water from meaningful distances, their spotted sides and behavior providing the wildlife quality that makes cold-water freshwater diving rewarding. Largemouth bass inhabit the shallower structure zones, while walleye patrol the mid-depth ranges with the deep-water preference characteristic of their species. The diversity of cold and warm water species that Deer Creek supports reflects the reservoir's range of depth and thermal zones.