Banks Lake National Wildlife Refuge, National Wildlife Refuge in Lanier County, Georgia.

Banks Lake National Wildlife Refuge covers 4,049 acres in Lanier County, Georgia, of which about 1,000 acres are open water; the rest is marsh, hardwood swamp and upland. The lake is a natural pocosin, a shallow sink of ancient geologic origin, and the refuge is administered by the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge with no staff of its own.

Banks Lake is a natural pocosin, likely shaped by ocean tides thousands of years ago. In the mid-19th century Joshua Lee dammed the drainage creek to power a grist mill for corn, wheat and rice, making the spot a trade center on the stagecoach route between Waresboro and Thomasville. The Nature Conservancy bought the land from the E.D. Rivers Estate on March 14, 1980, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service purchased it on February 22, 1985, redesignating it a national wildlife refuge.

The lake and mill Joshua Lee established in the mid-19th century made the area a trade centre on the stagecoach route between Waresboro and Thomasville. Today a concession, Banks Lake Outdoors, rents canoes and kayaks and sells fishing and hunting licences, bait, tackle, gifts and snacks. Fishing follows Georgia state law year-round, with largemouth bass, chain pickerel, crappie, bluegill, warmouth perch, flier and catfish the usual catch.

The refuge is open throughout the year and has free parking, restrooms, and a fishing dock near the water. A boat launch is available on site, and mornings tend to offer calmer water and more wildlife activity than afternoons.

Banks Lake is a natural pocosin, probably shaped by ocean tidal action and a more temperate climate thousands of years ago, not a river impoundment. In the 1970s the E.D. Rivers Estate threatened to drain it and harvest the lightered stumps and cypress trees before The Nature Conservancy bought the land in 1980.