Lac Bay in Lanaudière: How and When to Fish It

• Overview

  Lanaudière, Quebec, is where Lac Bay sits. The water sits 431 metres up. Surface area runs to about 10 hectares — small enough to read in one session. Roughly 1.6 km of bank means you can walk to a fresh area when one goes quiet. For supplies, Manawan is 46 km out. Ferme-Neuve follows at 92 km, then Weymontachie at 99 km. The nearest boundary is a fair way off.

• Where to Fish on Lac Bay

  Without a survey to go on, judge depth from how the bank falls away. On a natural lake the weed line and the shelf beyond it do the work. A soft bed grows weed late into autumn, which keeps fish shallow. Survey and observation records for Lanaudière include pumpkinseed, smallmouth bass, yellow perch, rock bass and brook trout. What holds for the county may not hold for this water. Fish Lac Bay to its features, not to its size.

• Seasonal Patterns

  Long-term averages put July at about 17°C and January near -16°C. Water stays cold even at the height of the year. Winter fishing happens on the ice here, with open water back around early May. Ice clears near early May and comes back about mid November in a typical year. Just after the ice goes and just before it returns, the fishing lifts. Plan around that when you fish Lac Bay.

• Tackle & Baits

  Access is not recorded for this water. It formed naturally, so levels move with rainfall rather than with a gate. No made access appears within a short radius, so plan to park on a verge and walk. For the bass here, soft plastics worked slow along cover and a spinnerbait for searching do most of the work. Where the road in crosses private land, ask first. Signs go up and come down, so check on the day. If the gate is shut, Lac Paiement at 1.2 km is the nearest alternative. Treat access at Lac Bay as something to verify.