Lac Palais Fishing in Laurentides, Quebec

• Overview

  Set in Laurentides, Quebec, this is Lac Palais. The surroundings are lake country bush. With some 22 hectares of water, there is room for a boat but no need of one. The bank runs about 3.1 km all the way round, so one visit can cover most of it. Some 15 km away sits Ferme-Neuve, the nearest settlement. Gatineau sits 144 km out, and it is the nearest city worth the name. One jurisdiction covers this water end to end.

• Where to Fish on Lac Palais

  No chart reached our records; the first cast is your sounding. Where the bottom changes texture, fish gather; find that line. Still water like this holds fish on the edges rather than out in the open. Records held for Laurentides cover pumpkinseed, smallmouth bass, yellow perch, brook trout and rock bass. The county figures include rivers and lakes alike. At Lac Palais the water rewards a slow, careful approach.

• Seasonal Patterns

  Seasonal averages run from -15°C in January up to 18°C in July. Expect a real winter and a strong spring after it. Ice-out usually falls in late April, and the weeks after it fish hardest. Break-up sits around late April on average, with the water closing again about late November. June through September is the settled part of the year, with the shoulders busier for fish. That is the shape of the year on Lac Palais.

• Tackle & Baits

  No public source sets out the position on this bank. No dam controls it, and the level follows the season. Nothing is mapped in the way of a ramp or car park within a short radius. For the bass here, soft plastics worked slow along cover and a spinnerbait for searching do most of the work. A landowner's word beats anything printed elsewhere. Access can change hands, so last year's answer may not hold. Lac Borcoman, 0.9 km away, makes the obvious fallback. None of that is settled for Lac Palais in what we hold.