Mattamuskeet National Wildlife Refuge in North Carolina is a federally protected landscape centered on Lake Mattamuskeet, the state’s largest natural lake. Covering 50,173 acres, it includes the entire lake and safeguards a broad wetland environment that supports white-tailed deer, river otters, bobcats, black bears, and red wolves. Its size and its association with North Carolina’s largest natural lake make it one of the state’s most distinctive protected areas. The refuge also contains the Lake Mattamuskeet Pump Station, or Mattamuskeet Lodge, listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980, connecting this natural setting to an earlier era of local development and water management.