Clean and cheap freshwater is an increasingly limited resource and humans continue to engineer systems to utilize available water resources. In some instances, the construction of dams and creation of lakes has caused drastic changes to ecosystems, yet there is limited research documenting some of these changes before, during, and after construction. Many lakes were created before the technology became available to assess water quality. This project assesses a lake development site in southwest Georgia to determine the baseline conditions of the watershed to compare water quality impacts upon lake construction, filling, and equilibration. The water quality within the catchment area was fairly typical, when compared to other water resources within the region. Possible issues for the future include high fecal coliform in some creeks, slightly elevated nutrient loads within some creeks, and slightly depressed dissolved oxygen, which may be compounded by the construction of a shallow lake.