Fishing at Poison Lake, Thompson-Nicola Regional District, British Columbia

• Overview

  Poison Lake is one of the Thompson-Nicola Regional District listings for British Columbia. It stands 1,129 metres above sea level. With some 11 hectares of water, there is room for a boat but no need of one. Roughly 1.7 km of bank means you can walk to a fresh area when one goes quiet. Some 64 km away sits 100 Mile House, the nearest settlement. The big place round here is Kamloops, 138 km distant. No boundary runs near, so the local rules hold throughout.

• Where to Fish on Poison Lake

  No figure exists for depth, so let the water show you. Look for the band where the shallows give up and the bottom falls away. On a natural lake the weed line and the shelf beyond it do the work. Public occurrence data for Thompson-Nicola Regional District names Chinook salmon, sockeye salmon, Coho salmon, rainbow trout and pink salmon. Protected fish appear in the records for this area, so treat the list as information, not an invitation. Fish Poison Lake to its features, not to its size.

• Seasonal Patterns

  The warmest month averages 15°C, the coldest about -8°C. Winter closes the water for a while, and the reopening is worth catching. Winter fishing happens on the ice here, with open water back around mid April. Average temperatures cross freezing around mid April in spring and again near mid November in autumn. Spring is short and heavy here; autumn is longer and steadier. Poison Lake fishes to that pattern most years.

• Tackle & Baits

  Nothing in our records says who may fish here. No dam controls it, and the level follows the season. No slipway, car park or made path shows up nearby in mapping, so treat access as rough. For the trout, small spinners and a box of nymphs cover both approaches. Some banks are open only from a marked point. Keep proof of licence with you rather than in the car. Riley Lake, 6.4 km away, makes the obvious fallback. Signs at Poison Lake carry more weight than any list.