Welcome to the Emerald Lake Fishing Guide. Emerald Lake or Lake Treganowan is a popular fishing location in Emerald. Roughly a 90-minute drive to beautifully maintained parkland and a great spot for a family outing. When you arrive you will need to pay for entry but you can quickly see why with well-manicured picnic grounds, play areas for the kids, paddle boats, ample parking, a kiosk and a picturesque lake. There are also lots of trees, stunning scenery and walking trails. The lake is stocked regularly with trout fingerlings by Vic fisheries during most school holidays. Therefore it’s a great location for fishing with kids and beginners. There is also a healthy number of redfin. It’s a stunning place with a lovely wooden bridge that goes over the lake. It’s a chance to venture into a vibrant town and take the kids to the iconic puffing billy.
**BECOME A FISHINGMAD MEMBER** Exclusive Fishing Workshops, Exciting Monthly Giveaways, In-Depth Fishing Reports with GPS Coordinates, Members Podcast, Interactive Maps, Catch of the Month Competitions, Kayak Club, Gear Guides, Rigging Tutorials, Tackle Talks, Sounder School, Fishing Tips, Fish Cleaning tutorials, Behind the scenes content & more.
Things to do at Emerald Lake
It’s a great destination to take the family with scenic views, and playgrounds for the kids. There are BBQ facilities, water activities, watercraft hires, open picnic grounds, walking trails, play areas for the kids, paddle boats, and fishing in the very picturesque lake. Entry costs are Children (3–15 years) $4, Children (under 3) free, Adults $7 Concession $5, Family ticket (2 adults, 2 children) $20. There is ample parking at the entrance and a kiosk onsite.
Emerald is a lovely township. It’s well known for hosting the puffing billy steam railway tracks and trains. Within 15 kilometres travel includes the Glen Harrow tree top walks, Sherbrooke forset, Cardinia Reservoir, Kokoda walking trial and Dandenong ranges. plenty of good reason to venture out to Emerald lake. Click here to see active maps of Emerald Lake
Watch our detailed video guide on our top 10 redfin lures below
Fishing at Emerald Lake
Stocked Trout will be your main target here. Powerbait trout nuggets suspended from a float area are a great option for fishing here. I keep the power bait about 40cm underneath the float. Power bait is similar to what stocked trout are used to eating in the farming hatcheries so they will eagerly take power bait. Use some trout pellets as burely to bring them into the area, many locals have noted this as key to catching more fish in this spot. Other bait options include scrub worms, maggots, corn, and mudeye. Either from a float or with a light running sinker rig.
This is a great location for small lures and soft plastics. Why not have a look at our guide on the best lures to catch Redfin. Small spinners and small minnow imitation soft plastics lightly weighed are a great option here for trout. So are smaller size tassie devils. Smaller Shallow diving hard body lures such as bullet lures, Daiwa double-clutch, Rapala Countdown series and Savage gear minnows are also excellent choices.
When targeting Trout fish as light as possible which will make the experience more fun and improve your chances. Redfin will actively take many baits or lures. To maximize your chances fish with a 1-3 or 2-4 kilo rod. The mainline spooled with a 4-pound braid finished with a good quality leader. Stocking of the lake happens prior to each school holiday, so that’s the best time to go. But make sure you put all the small trout caught back into the system to grow. Most freshwater species have a tendency to feed more aggressively at Dawn and Dusk. My personal favourite is fishing sundown, particularly in the warmer months. Use this link to follow Victorian trout stocking programs.
Please note that it can be challenging to fish at this location due to heavy weeds and reeds. It can also be challenging when hired watercraft are continually going over your fishing lines. You will need to take some time to find a quiet patch to fish, so your session isn’t continually uninterrupted. You may also need to consider using flotas or lightly weighted lures to avoid weed.
Fishing Lake Treganowan Emerald
This video highlights how to target stocked rainbow trout. This lake is stocked with rainbow trout every year during most school holidays so this video should provide you with some helpful tips.
Recommended baits Emerald Lake Treganowan
- Powerbait
- Scrub worms
- Mudeye
- maggots
Recommended lures Emerald Lake Treganowan
- Bluefox spinners
- Daiwa DR joint minnows
- Daiwa Bait Junkie 2.5 inch grub
- Savage Gear minnow blade
- Berkley powerbait grub
- Daiwa Presso minnows
- Tasmanian Devil Blade
- Bullet lures 5-0 minnow
- Bullet lures 3cm lure
- strike tiger nymph
- Rapala countdown floating minnow
- Daiwa Double Clutch
- Tasmanian Devil lure
- Gulp 3 inch minnow
- Zman 2.5 inch grub
- Dawia Bait Junkie paddle tail minnow
- Savage Gear Fathead crank shallow diving
- Squidges biotough grub
Targeting Redfin at Emerald Lake Treganowan
We recommend targeting redfin with a light spin outfit. This will make the experience more enjoyable and improve your catch rates. A 1-3 or 2-4 kilo fishing rod coupled with a 2000, 2500 or 3000 reel spooled with 4-8-pound braid and equivalent fluorocarbon leader should be perfect.
Redfin respond really well to lures and soft plastics so do check our guide on the best lures for catching Redfin When using soft plastics, we highly recommend curl tails, minnow imitations, and paddle tails in both natural and bright colours. Rigged with a jig head that’s 1/8 through to 1/20 in weight. The most effective way to use these is to cast towards visible structure and slow roll the soft plastic with lifts and pauses for the retrieve. Shallow diving hard body lures, blades and vibes are also very effective in this system. So are traditional spinners and Tassie devils in bright colours. Metal spoons also play a role allowing you to cast great distances and target the bigger size reddies. Just remember they are quite heavy and very prone to snags in small inland systems like this one.
Targeting Trout at Emerald Lake Treganowan
We would highly recommend that you read our detailed guide on how to catch trout which details our favourite lures, baits and techniques. You can follow trout stocking timelines by reading the Victorian trout stocking guide as part of the target 1 million by 2020 and 10 million by 2022 initiatives.
When targeting trout with lures we recommend using shallow diving hard body minnows, metal spoons, spinners, Tassie devils and soft plastics which are also very effective on trout. If your bait fishing, then Mudeye, scrub worms, power bait, yabbies and minnows suspended from a float or a running sinker rig are great options when targeting trout at this location. Trout are more active in cold conditions with most catches on the first and last light of the day. We recommend targeting trout with a 1-3 or 2-4 kilo fishing rod coupled with 1000, 2000, or 2500 reel spooled with 4-8-pound braid and equivalent fluorocarbon leader. If there are larger trophy size trout around then you can go heavier moving up the scale to a 3-5 kilo class spin rod spooled with a fine 8-12-pound braid and equivalent fluorocarbon leader.
We conducted a test to see which would perform better for stocked trout powerbait or lures.
All country areas are inhabited by wildlife such as Snakes and Lizards, so be wary of venomous snakes such as Brown, Tiger and Red-bellied Black.
No powered boats are allowed on the water. Camping and open fires are prohibited. Be wary of surrounding birdlife. Always carry your Victorian fishing license, FishingMad encourages ‘catch & release’ of all native species to help maintain the water quality within the lake however European Carp must not be returned.
All images and videos shown on the Emerald Lake Fishing Guide are Fishing Mad originals.
Thank you for visiting the Emerald Lake Fishing Guide. If you feel this location guide is missing any key information or needs any corrections made, then please let us know by emailing our team at enquiries@fishingmad.com.au with specific details in the email. Thank you
