In 1971, just after what a later study would identify as the point when the lakes eutrophication began in earnest, M.C. Healey and W.L. Woodall, two researchers from the Fisheries Research Board of Canada, considered Frame in a limnological study of seven lakes in and around Yellowknife that their agency was considering as sites for an experimental fishery. Among the others studied were the larger Kam Lake to the south, and five others outside city limits. Their analysis, published in 1973, showed that while Frames water quality was still good enough to support the recreational use that was still occurring, there were already some signs of decline.
Chemical analysis of the water showed similarities to Kam Lake. Like the larger lake, it had a notably alkaline pH of 8.5, reflecting higher concentrations of salts, and a specific conductance of 332, well below Kam but around three times the values obtained for the other four lakes. Its calcium, magnesium, potassium, and sodium levels were higher than any other lake except Kam, and it had the highest bicarbonate levels at 132.4 mg/L. The lake was found to be generally isothermal, although its depths cooled significantly in August, when the later of two samples was taken. Plenty of oxygen was still in the water. The researchers attributed Frames high biochemical oxygen demand and "peculiar chemical characteristics" to not only the proximity of downtown but the citys use of the lake as a dump for plowed snow.
"Frame Lake had the most peculiar species assemblage for the region", the two wrote of the results of their zooplankton findings. Daphnia middendoffiana, the only Cladocera species found in Frame, was present in only that lake of the seven. Likewise, several copepods—Heterecope sententrionalis and Diaptomus pribilofensis and leptopus—were unique to Frame. Cyclops vernalis was the only species the lake shared with any of the others. "The species in Frame Lake are typical of a lake west of the continental divide, in Alaska or northern British Columbia, but extremely uncommon east of the divide", they observed.
Benthos species in Frame were more similar to the other lakes. Frame shared with the other lakes a high mollusk population, predominantly in the Sphaeriidae and Valvatidae families. Lymnaeidae were unique to it, however. Insect populations around the lake are dominated by non-biting midges, especially the Chironominae and Tanypodinae subfamilies. Healey and Woodall also found significant populations of mayflies, damselflies, and water boatmen in the lake.
They did not find any fish, the only one of the seven lakes where this was the case. Frame nevertheless recorded the highest biomass count of the seven lakes, 7.32 grams of dry weight per square meter of bed, more than three times the second highest reading, on the second of two sampling periods in summer 1971. At the same time, that biomass had the lowest ash content of any of the sampled lakes as well.