Old Lake CottageRainbow Trout fishing near Tobermory, ON
1,944 documented waters within 300 km, 74 of them with rainbow trout as the primary species.
Where they are biting today
- Lower Griffin Lake (Sault Ste. Marie)77
- Flyline Lake (Chapleau)77
- Cuncic Lake (Sault Ste. Marie)77
- Snare Lake (Sault Ste. Marie)77
- Portage Lake (Sault Ste. Marie)77
- Alona Bay Creek77
- Kynoch Creek77
- Least Lake (Chapleau)77
- Chippewa River77
- East Carp River77
Fishing rainbow trout around Tobermory
Finding rainbow trout around Tobermory does not have to be guesswork. This page tracks 1944 documented waters in the surrounding area where rainbow trout are documented, then re-ranks them every day as conditions shift. Below is the local picture: which waters stand out right now, and how anglers actually fish for the species here.
Start with Lower Griffin Lake (Sault Ste. Marie), today's top scorer at 77 (about 294 km from Tobermory, roughly 30 m of water at its deepest). If it is busy or the wind is wrong, Flyline Lake (Chapleau) scores 77 (about 283 km from Tobermory, roughly 9 m of water at its deepest). Cuncic Lake (Sault Ste. Marie) at 77 is the third card worth keeping in hand. All of these numbers come from the same daily model, so they are directly comparable water to water.
Rainbow trout feed heavily on aquatic insects, making fly fishing an especially effective and popular approach - matching whatever's actively hatching (the real logic behind 'matching the hatch') often outproduces guessing at random patterns. Rainbows are widely distributed in the Great Lakes and their tributaries plus some inland lakes; in spring they gather in warmer nearshore water off river and harbour mouths and along sandy or gravelly windward shorelines. In tributaries, drifting roe bags, egg patterns or beads under a float is the dominant approach, downsized with light leaders in clear water; on the big lakes, trolling spoons and minnow-imitating plugs takes fish.
Everything above is recomputed daily - the numbers on this page reflect September 14, 2026 - so check back before committing to a water: the leaders genuinely change as weather systems move through.