Scenic Birch Lake, with its trophy smallmouth bass, is set on the southern arm of the Canadian Shield, north of Kingston. Frontenac Provincial Park is a semi-wilderness park that encompasses dozens of lakes, Birch Lake being one of the larger ones on its western flank.

While Birch Lake is known to give up good-sized lake trout, nowadays the lake is fished more for smallmouth bass, black crappie and northern pike. The weedbeds and reefs make excellent bass and pike habitat, and anglers often find that they have no trouble catching their limit with spoons and jigs.

The smallmouth bass in Birch Lake tend to be quite large. In fact, Colin McKeown, from The New Fly Fisher show, caught an Ontario record 7 lb bass on Birch Lake. McKeown’s fly was a white Upmqua Gamechanger.

Ice fishers should bear in mind that power augers, chainsaws, generators, ATVs and snowmobiles are not permitted in the park.

LAKE ACCESS

Birch Lake is located 12 km northeast of Verona on Highway 38, 35 km north of Kingston.

From Verona, take Highway 38 north, then take the first right turn and follow the main road for 13 km past Desert Lake. Turn left at the intersection and proceed for another 1.6 km to a small bridge and a boat-launch.