Cottages For Sale on Pigeon Lake

Owning a cottage on Pigeon Lake

Pigeon Lake is long and fairly narrow, running about 27 km from Bobcaygeon in the north toward Omemee in the south. It is the first of the Tri-Lakes, and from here you can boat into Buckhorn and Chemong lakes without going through a single lock. That long, lock-free stretch of open water is a big part of its appeal to boaters and anglers alike.

Two municipalities share the shore. The City of Kawartha Lakes has the west and south sides, Trent Lakes in Peterborough County has the north and east, and a small piece in the centre-east falls in Selwyn. Which side a cottage sits on decides who issues your building and septic permits, who collects your taxes and which short-term rental rules apply.

About 1,560 homes line the lake, and Kawartha Conservation found more than half are lived in year-round. Less of the shoreline is built up than on neighbouring Sturgeon Lake, with about 29% of the land within 30 m of the water developed in 2013. The southern end is quieter and weedier, while the north end near Bobcaygeon is busier and deeper.

• Tri-lake boating
• Bobcaygeon
• Many islands
• Bass and muskie

History of Pigeon Lake

People have lived around Pigeon Lake for thousands of years. An archaeological site on Jacob Island holds remains dating to around 4700 BC. The lake lies in the Treaty 20 area of the Williams Treaties First Nations, and Curve Lake First Nation is among the communities with a stake in how the lake is managed.

The lake grew when a dam was built at Buckhorn in the early 1830s, and that dam was improved in the 1880s as the Trent-Severn Waterway took shape. At the north end, Thomas Need founded Bobcaygeon in 1833, and the Boyd family later built one of the largest lumber operations in Upper Canada there. Through the 1800s, log drives and steamboats were a common sight on the lake.

Lock-free boating on the Tri-Lakes

Water leaves Pigeon Lake at Gannon Narrows on the east side and runs into Buckhorn Lake. Together with Chemong Lake, these form a long stretch of open boating with no locks. Heading north, Lock 32 at Bobcaygeon lifts you into Sturgeon Lake; it is the busiest lock on the Trent-Severn, with about 7,400 boats in 2011.

There are two sand bars on the west side, near Long Point Bay and north of Grenadier Island. Learn the markers before running the lake at speed.

Weed beds, wild rice and starry stonewort

Most of Pigeon Lake is shallow, averaging just over 3 m deep. Aquatic plants grow thickly in the shallow southern bays, and wild rice has spread across parts of the south end in the last decade. That is great habitat for fish and birds, but it can make swimming and boating off some southern lots awkward by mid-summer.

Zebra mussels arrived years ago and have made the water clearer, which Wikipedia notes has hurt walleye numbers. Starry stonewort, a newer invasive algae that forms dense mats, has also been observed in Pigeon Lake. Clean, drain and dry your boat when moving between lakes.

Fishing Pigeon Lake

Pigeon Lake was the 14th most fished lake in Ontario by days fished in a 2005 survey, with about 115,000 angling hours a year. Bass, walleye and muskellunge are the main targets, along with yellow perch and other panfish. Lake herring hold in the deep northern basin.

Zone 17 rules apply. The Bobcaygeon River below the dams at Bobcaygeon is a fish sanctuary, closed in winter and into May.

Water quality and beaches

The lake is moderately productive. Lake-wide phosphorus averages about 16 micrograms per litre, below the provincial objective, and has dropped about 35% from its historical peak. Most of the lake's water arrives from Sturgeon Lake. The north end has had episodic blue-green algae blooms, and an advisory was issued in 2011.

There are three public beaches: Crowe's Line, Omemee Peace Park and Emily Provincial Park. Omemee was posted unsafe for swimming most of the time between 2010 and 2014, so ask locally before planning on a public swim. Emily Provincial Park also has about 300 campsites.

Bobcaygeon, Omemee and services

Bobcaygeon, at the north tip, is the main service town and a regional hub for the area. Omemee sits near the south end. The Gamiing Nature Centre on the west shore runs programs on a 100-acre property. For hospital care, Ross Memorial Hospital in Lindsay is the only hospital in the City of Kawartha Lakes.