Crotch lake sounds like everything you are looking for - No portages and definitely has a good population of pike and smallmouth bass- can also go up Farm lake as well which also has a good population of bass and pike

Hope that helps.
     Andy

Yes those lakes are in Algonquin - Access #17

Very few lakes in Algonquin have pike. The Crotch/Farm area (access point 17), as mentioned above, is one of the only parts of the park that does. That includes the whole Opeongo River corridor, but not Lake Opeongo itself, so if you don't mind doing a couple of short portages from Crotch, Booth Lake is a nice spot and people catch pike there too. If the east end of the park is easier for you, Basin Lake and Sec/Wet lakes are basically your other choices for pike. Those are access points 19 and 20 and are basically drive-to/paddle-in lakes with nowhere to go by canoe from there.

Edit - sorry I missed the "probably won't be portaging". So yeah... Crotch, Farm, Basin and Sec are your choices and Crotch might be your best bet.

Last edited by DanPM (6/13/2016 7:53 am)

Lake Traverse. Access 23.

No portages. Huge Lake. Has pike. Has way more to explore than shall/crotch - I wouldn't waste your time with that area. It'll probably be crowded and you're camping under a hydro field - and a lot of the campsites are way too close to eachother for any real backcountry experience. Traverse you can explore up or down the Petewawa - down pretty far if you're not looking to portage.

Can't go wrong with Traverse. Beautiful campsites.

Last edited by Peek (6/13/2016 10:23 am)

I could be wrong (I've never actually pulled in a pike from Lake Traverse) but there are at least two online resources which disagree with that statement. There appear to be no Pike in the Petewawa system until you get to Lake Traverse. There is a good variety of sport fishing from there south, including musky, pike, truout & bass.

Again though, I've never caught one from Traverse - the above is just data pulled from Fish ON-line and Jeff's Map (and I'm sure a trip report or two is floating out there with pike shots from this area)

Peek wrote:

I could be wrong (I've never actually pulled in a pike from Lake Traverse) but there are at least two online resources which disagree with that statement. There appear to be no Pike in the Petewawa system until you get to Lake Traverse. There is a good variety of sport fishing from there south, including musky, pike, truout & bass.

Again though, I've never caught one from Traverse - the above is just data pulled from Fish ON-line and Jeff's Map (and I'm sure a trip report or two is floating out there with pike shots from this area)

Jeff's Map shows muskie in Lake Travers, not pike. The symbols look kind of similar, since the fish themselves look similar, but that's muskie (the right-facing, light green fish) on Travers. Fish ON-Line does show pike there granted, but Fish ON-Line has a lot of errors, including false pike positives.

The FOAP Fishes of APP booklet says that:
"In Algonquin Park, it appears that Northern Pike are native only to Basin Lake and Upper Pine Lake (and adjoining rivers and streams) just inside the Park's southeastern boundary as the result of dispersal into the Bonnechère River system sometime during the past 10,000 years. Natural dispersal into other waterbodies was likely prevented by the presence of physical barriers outside Park boundaries. Nevertheless, in the early 1980s, Northern Pike appeared in several Algonquin lakes in the Opeongo River system. These populations were almost certainly established as the result of illegal introductions by people." 

Nothing about the Petawawa system, though the entry on muskie says that muskie are "present in the Petawawa River from Lake Travers to the eastern boundary".

Jeff's map also has a note on Basin Lake saying it's one of two Algonquin Park lakes that naturally supports pike. Per the booklet, Upper Pine is the other one, and the Crotch-Booth population is introduced; none of this explains what the deal is with the pike of Sec and Wet lakes, which are labelled on Jeff's map.

Haha well I'd seen it before so it was more flipping to the page than research. But yeah, I would guess the Sec-Wet-Mallard population is introduced. I was just curious why the booklet's pike entry doesn't mention Wet etc at all, when it goes into so much detail about Crotch/Kitty/Booth, even showing a map of the year in which each lake in that chain was colonized by pike. I mentioned that omission as a caveat to my conclusion about Travers, since it is possible there are pike in lakes that aren't discussed in the booklet. However, I imagine whatever is in Lake Travers is also present all the way down the Petawawa from there, so that would be a pretty significant area to leave out.

Wow lots of info and still learning the areas and different lakes. I did laugh about the wife and excited dog while trying to land a large pike. Was thinking of leaving next week for up to 5 days and had farm and crotch lake in mind but that mention of hydro lines and lots of campers close is sort of a turnoff. Looking for eating size pike and maybe a bit larger  (also trying to find regs on that within the park). So is farm or crotch not a great choice?
Will be renting a canoe so getting the outfitter to drop off is easiest which probably makes a difference where I go.
I guess I have to buy a water filter. Any recommendations? MSR I've heard of but can I count on $400?

Also I downloaded Jeffs map. Very helpful.

Last edited by Moyo (6/15/2016 10:28 am)