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Overview
H.V. Eastman Lake is an approximately 1,780-acre reservoir on the Chowchilla River in the Sierra Nevada foothills of Madera County (with a small portion in Mariposa County), about an hour north of Fresno. Buchanan Dam was completed in the mid-1970s by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Sacramento District, for flood risk management, irrigation storage, recreation, and wildlife management.
At maximum capacity the lake stores about 150,000 acre-feet behind an earth-and-rockfill dam roughly 200 feet high. Foothill coves, oak woodland shoreline, and a relatively compact basin give Eastman a quieter character than the larger Mother Lode reservoirs to the north.
Corps parks and campgrounds make Eastman a family-oriented destination for boating, camping, and fishing for bass, crappie, and other warmwater species managed by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife. Public ramps and day-use areas support visitors from the central San Joaquin Valley.
Water levels are managed by the Corps around a commonly cited full-pool elevation near 587 feet above mean sea level, with substantial seasonal drawdown for flood space and irrigation. Elevations can fall far below full pool in dry years, so monitoring current lake levels is important for ramp usability, fishing, and camping access.
Eastman Lake is a 1,780-acre reservoir on the Chowchilla River managed by U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Sacramento District.