Puslinch Lake

Where Puslinch Lake is

Puslinch Lake lies in the County of Wellington, within the Township of Puslinch.

How deep is Puslinch Lake?

The deepest mapped contour on Puslinch Lake is 3.0 meters, and the water within that boundary descends even farther. Ontario’s bathymetry record holds 5 depth contours for Puslinch Lake.

Surveyed Depths

Ontario has surveyed the depths of several thousand of its lakes over more than half a century. Later surveys were conducted by boat with satellite positioning and produced hundreds of thousands of soundings per lake. Earlier surveys were charted by running transects across the water and drawing depth contours by hand.

Water quality

Ontario’s Lake Partner Program is a volunteer monitoring network. Participants collect a water sample each spring for phosphorus analysis and measure water clarity through the summer with a Secchi disk.

Phosphorus is the nutrient that controls how much algae a lake can grow. A lake with little phosphorus stays clear and supports cold-water fish such as lake trout. As phosphorus rises, algae increase, the water clouds, and oxygen in the deep water falls as the algae decay. The province classifies each monitoring site by its spring phosphorus. Below 10 micrograms per litre is oligotrophic: clear water and low algae. From 10 to 20 is mesotrophic: moderately productive water, with more algae and weed growth than an oligotrophic lake but rarely a bloom. Above 20 is eutrophic: nutrient-rich water, prone to algal blooms and low oxygen at depth.

A Secchi disk is a 20 centimeter white or black-and-white plate lowered on a marked line until it disappears from view. The depth at which it vanishes is the Secchi depth, a direct measure of water clarity. Clearer water gives a deeper reading.

Puslinch Lake has 1 Lake Partner monitoring site, which has yet reported phosphorus for the three years the province requires before a status is assigned.

Fish in Puslinch Lake

Ontario’s aquatic resource records name 13 fish species in Puslinch Lake. The province classes the lake as warm water. The record took effect on 31 October 2019, and its note records how the species present were confirmed: “w2 – confirmed or probable seasonal or permanent use by Northern Pike and/or Walleye.” The province’s other records for the lake name three further species, brook trout, muskellunge and rainbow trout. They appear in the records below.

Nine of the sixteen species in the province’s records

• Northern Pikepike
• Walleyeperch
• Yellow Perchperch
• Smallmouth Basssunfish
• Largemouth Basssunfish
• Black Crappiesunfish
• Pumpkinseedsunfish
• Bluegillsunfish
• Brown Bullheadcatfish

Spawning areas

Ontario maps 2 fish spawning records within the Puslinch Lake outline, for two species, all of them mapped areas.

By number of records

By area mapped

• Walleye1 area1.4 ha
• Yellow Perch1 area300 m²

The federal Fisheries Act prohibits the harmful alteration, disruption or destruction of fish habitat without an authorization, so a dock, dredging, infill or shoreline work at a mapped spawning area is reviewed on that basis.

Stocking history

Ontario’s stocking records for Puslinch Lake run from 1946 to 1990 and hold 54 releases. Walleye account for most of the fish: 1,410,000 released in six of the years between 1947 and 1979. The last recorded release was 750 rainbow trout yearlings in 1990.

The province’s current stocking programme, recorded from 2016, lists no release into Puslinch Lake.

Eating the fish

The 2025 Guide to Eating Ontario Fish carries consumption advice for seven species taken from Puslinch Lake, tested for contaminants at a sampling location in Puslinch Twp., Wellington Co. Each figure below is the most meals a month the guide advises for a fish of that length. The advice falls as the fish gets longer, because mercury accumulates over a fish’s life. A zero means the guide advises no meals of that fish at that size.

General population adultsSensitive population children under fifteen, women who are or may become pregnant

Fisheries Management Zone 16

Puslinch Lake lies in Fisheries Management Zone 16. Ontario sets its fishing seasons and catch limits by zone. Zone 16 is the most southerly inland zone in the province and takes in all of southwestern Ontario, with Toronto, Mississauga, Hamilton, Kitchener-Waterloo and London. The province describes it as a zone of large river systems, with Lake Simcoe and Lake Couchiching its large lakes, carrying important recreational and tourism fisheries under high fishing effort.

The figures are the number of fish an angler may catch and keep in a day and have in possession, under a sport fishing licence and under a conservation licence. The rows are the whole zone’s, and they apply to every lake in it. No waterbody exception names Puslinch Lake.

Puslinch Lake Ice Fishing

An ice hut on Puslinch Lake must be removed by March 15. Puslinch Lake lies in fisheries management zone 16, one of the twenty zones Ontario sets its fishing rules by, and one removal date applies across the whole zone.

An ice hut must also be removed before the ice breaks up, whether or not that date has passed. The deadline clears huts from the ice ahead of the thaw and does not close the fishing season.

Registration is required in zone 16 for an ice hut built of anything other than fabric, and for a fabric tent covering seven square meters or more. Registration is free, and the number is displayed on the outside of the hut.

Ice conditions

No public record reports the thickness or the condition of the ice on Puslinch Lake on any given day. Ontario publishes ice safety guidance for anyone going out on the ice, at ontario.ca.

Islands and names

Puslinch Lake contains 5 islands in the Ontario Hydro Network’s outline, zero of them over 10 hectares and three under a tenth of a hectare.

Official names

Ontario’s geographic names register lists 4 official names on the water and its islands: 4 islands. A further 1 named point stands on the mainland shore.

Points on the shore 1

• McCormick Point

Nearby lakes

• Lake Belwood38 km away
• Conestogo Lake49 km away
• Lake Eugenia103 km away
• Lake Simcoe128 km away

All lakes

Questions about Puslinch Lake

• How deep is Puslinch Lake?

  Its deepest charted contour is 3 meters, and the water within it is deeper.

• How big is Puslinch Lake?

  Its surface covers 1.6 square kilometers and it holds 5 islands. Of its 8 kilometers of shoreline, 7 kilometers is the mainland shore and 1 kilometers is the shore of the islands.

• What fish are in Puslinch Lake?

  Ontario’s aquatic resource records name thirteen species, among them walleye, smallmouth bass, largemouth bass, northern pike, yellow perch and black crappie. The lake’s spawning, consumption and stocking records also name brook trout, muskellunge and rainbow trout.