Lac du Versant in Saguenay/Lac-Saint-Jean: How and When to Fish It

• Overview

  Lac du Versant falls in Saguenay/Lac-Saint-Jean, part of Quebec. It sits at 725 metres above sea level. The water measures roughly 2 hectares, so nothing here is far from anything else. Our Saguenay/Lac-Saint-Jean list holds plenty of bigger water. Nearest town is Saint-Honoré, 35 km off. Further out sit Saint-Fulgence (40 km) and Saint-Ambroise (45 km). The nearest boundary is well away, so one set of rules covers the water.

• Where to Fish on Lac du Versant

  There is no recorded depth, so work from what you can see. On a natural lake the weed line and the shelf beyond it do the work. The productive water is a rod length or two out, not a hundred. Survey and observation records for Saguenay/Lac-Saint-Jean include northern pike, Atlantic salmon, lake whitefish and fallfish. Several of these carry legal protection or closed seasons; the rulebook comes before the rod. Take Lac du Versant a stretch at a time.

• Seasonal Patterns

  Between January at about -19°C and July at about 15°C, the water has a wide range to work through. This is a two-season water: locked, then wide open. Ice fishing carries the winter, and the water opens about mid May. The water is typically free of ice between mid May and early November. The open run goes from the thaw to the freeze, and April through October covers most of it. Plan around that when you fish Lac du Versant.

• Tackle & Baits

  Whether the bank is open is not something our records settle. Nothing is listed nearby for parking or launching a boat. Pike mean a wire trace, no exceptions; big spoons and jerkbaits do the searching. Check locally before you travel, because a wasted drive is a long one. Some stretches are reserved and marked as such on the ground. Should this one be busy, Lac McKnight is 1.1 km off. Where Lac du Versant is concerned, a local answer beats a written one.