Lower Seymour Conservation Reserve, North Vancouver · ~25 minutes from downtown Vancouver · written for a first cast, October 2026 · reviewed 11 October 2026
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Your car has to be out of the gate at the bottom of Lillooet Road by closing time — and in stocking season that is about when the light goes. Metro Vancouver posts the closing hour month by month: 6 or 7 pm in October (the page gives both and no changeover date, so plan on 6), 5 pm from November through February. The gate is not at the lake; it is at the foot of the road, a few kilometres downhill, so stop fishing early enough to drive out. The evening bite that every trout article recommends happens after the lot has emptied, for half the year.
Where the stocking stands right now
Most lakes in these guides get one fall truck. Rice gets the same number of fish every autumn, delivered in pieces — which means a stocking report showing “Rice, 1,000 fish” is the start of the season, not the whole of it.
Stocked 8 October 2026
1,000 catchable rainbows in, and the season has barely started
The Freshwater Fisheries Society put 1,000 Fraser Valley rainbows at about 227 g into Rice on 8 October, the same day as Lafarge, Como and Green Timbers. That is the only Rice release so far this fall, as of 11 October.
If 2026 follows the last ten years, another ~3,500 fish follow in one to three more loads, the last of them usually somewhere between 20 October and 5 November.
Check the Lower Mainland stocking report for a new RICE row before a weekend trip: the day after a truck is the easiest day of the year.
The stocked lake planner shows Rice as one fall bar and has already greyed it out as stocked. That is the forecast’s shape — one release per season — not a sign that the fall is over here.
The pattern, fall by fall
Fall
Loads
First → last
Fish
2021
2
22 Sep → 20 Oct
4,500
2022
3
7 Oct → 21 Oct
4,500
2023
4
12 Oct → 1 Nov
4,500
2024
3
3 Oct → 22 Oct
4,500
2025
4
2 Oct → 27 Oct
4,500
2026
1 so far
8 Oct → …
1,000
Every fall from 2016 to 2025 was 4,500 fish except 2017 (4,127). Spring is bigger and longer: about 5,000 fish in four to seven loads in most years, usually starting mid-March (February in 2026) and running to mid-June. Roughly 9,500 trout a year, into a lake you can walk around in half an hour.
What actually swims here
Rice is a small, artificial lake that Metro Vancouver keeps for education, habitat and recreation inside a drinking-water reserve. It is a put-and-take trout pond in a forest, and almost everything you hook will have come off a truck.
Stocked
Catchable rainbow trout — the whole reason to come
Fraser Valley strain, triploid — sterile, so they put their energy into growing rather than spawning, and they cannot establish a wild population.
They go in at about 210–250 g, which is roughly 25–28 cm. A pan-sized fish, not a trophy.
Freshly stocked fish travel in loose schools, cruise the shallows and take almost anything for the first few days. They wise up fast after that.
Carryover
Holdovers — the winter fishery
Fall fish that are not caught are still there in December, and a little bigger. The lake is open all year; there is no seasonal closure on Rice.
Slower and pickier than stocking-week fish. Bait fished slowly, midday, is the way to catch one in winter.
Metro Vancouver does not monitor the ice. If the lake skims over in a cold snap, fishing is over until it melts — do not go out on it.
Closed
Not here: the Seymour River
The river is a short walk east and looks like the better water. It is closed to all fishing, from the Seymour Dam to the estuary.
DFO closed it to salmon in 2015 after the Seymour Canyon rockslide, in tandem with a provincial order; the Region 2 synopsis carries the provincial half as “No Fishing downstream of Seymour Lake”, tributaries included. Metro Vancouver still posts it at the top of the reserve’s page.
Your trout rod stays at the lake.
The map
North is up. One road in, one lot, one short walk to the water, and a loop trail that stays close to the shore the whole way round. Nothing about the access is complicated except the clock.
Schematic, not to scale — it shows the order of things on the way in. Green is the wharf, the one built fishing platform; the loop trail gives you shore access most of the way round. Red is closed: the river to fishing, the Mainline to walking.
Getting there, and getting out
Driving in
Head for Capilano University in North Vancouver and keep driving north on Lillooet Road: past the university, past the North Vancouver Cemetery, and up the gravel to the big lot at the road’s end. Rice Lake is a short walk north from there.
On a sunny weekend the lot fills with trail users, not anglers — arrive early and you will be the only rod there.
Leave the water with time to spare. The posted hour is when cars must be out of the lower gate, not when you should start packing.
Gate hours, month by month
Nov – Feb
6 am – 5 pm
Mar – Apr
6 am – 7 pm
May
6 am – 7 pm, then 9 pm
Jun – Aug
6 am – 9 pm
September
6 am – 8 pm
October
6 am – 6 or 7 pm
Metro Vancouver gives May and October as two times with no changeover day, so assume the earlier one. Open 365 days; areas can close in bad weather. The 6 am opening is the good news — the morning bite is fully available all year.
Without a car
No bus runs to the reserve. Lillooet Road is several kilometres of steady climb from the buses at Capilano University; it is a fair ride on a bike and a long walk with a rod and a cooler.
From Lynn Valley, the Varley Trail links Lynn Headwaters Regional Park to the lake — a pleasant walk in, if someone can drop you at Lynn Headwaters.
Bikes are fine on the reserve’s roads and the paved Trailway, but not on the Rice Lake Loop itself. Lock up at the lake.
Accessibility
One of the best wheelchair-access fisheries in the region, and the synopsis says so in its own line: “excellent path system; see gate attendant for access.”
The 2 km loop is low-gradient compacted gravel; the wharf, the picnic sites and the toilets carry the accessible symbol on Metro Vancouver’s map.
“See gate attendant” is the province’s wording for arranging closer vehicle access; call Metro Vancouver at 604-432-6200 (weekdays 8–4:30) before the trip rather than counting on an attendant on the day.
The rules that actually catch people out
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The synopsis line for Rice Lake reads, in full: “RICE LAKE (North Vancouver) 2-8 — Trout/char daily quota = 2; wheelchair accessible.” Everything else on this page is either a regional default or a Metro Vancouver park rule.
Quota: 2, not 4
Trout/char 2 per day — half the Region 2 default. People who read the regional page and stop there get this wrong.
Possession limit is two daily quotas, so 4 in the freezer from Rice, and stocking-week fishing makes the limit easy to reach before 9 am.
No minimum size for trout in lakes, so every stocked fish is keepable.
Hooks and bait — looser than you might expect
There is no single-barbless rule on Rice. In Region 2 that rule is for streams and for the lakes that list it (Deer Lake does; Rice does not). A spinner with its factory treble is legal here.
Bait is allowed — worms, dough bait, eggs. The one thing you cannot use is dead fish as bait; in Region 2 that is for sturgeon on the Fraser only.
Pinching barbs anyway is a kindness if you are releasing fish, and it makes unhooking with kids around a lot easier.
Park rules at the lake
No boats and no inflatables — that rules out float tubes and paddleboards too. Shore and wharf only.
No dogs on the Rice Lake Loop, and none anywhere north of the line just above the main lot. Bring the dog and you will be fishing from the parking lot.
No swimming and no bikes at the lake.
No harvesting of anything else in the reserve — plants, mushrooms, wildlife. The trout are the exception because the province stocks them for you.
The licence
BC freshwater licence only. No tidal licence and no conservation surcharge stamp — there are no salmon in Rice, and the river where there might be is closed.
Resident annual $41.15, one-day $11.43, eight-day $22.86, 65+ $5.71. The licence year runs April 1 to March 31.
BC residents under 16 do not need one, and still get their own quota of 2.
Buy through the province’s WILD system with a free FWID; carry the licence and photo ID while fishing.
What to bring
The Rice Lake rig — dough bait on a sliding sinker
Tie it: thread the egg sinker and a bead onto the main line, tie on the swivel, then 45–60 cm of leader and a size 8–10 hook. Stocked trout were raised on pellets, and dough bait is the closest thing to them.
Bait it: mould a pea-sized ball of floating dough bait over the hook, covering the point. Garlic-scented PowerBait has been the most reliable flavour at Rice for us.
Fish it: cast, let the sinker settle, wind in until the line is just tight, set the rod down and watch the tip. When it taps and then pulls away, lift the rod firmly.
No bites in 20 minutes? Re-bait (dough washes out), lengthen the leader, or move along the loop. A worm under a float set 1–1.5 m deep is the fallback, from the wharf or any open bank.
The one rod
A 6′6″ to 7′ light spinning rod, 2500 reel, 4–6 lb line. These are 25 cm fish in clear water; lighter line gets more bites.
Nothing here needs more than that. An ultralight is even more fun.
Lures and flies
Small inline spinners (size 0–2) and small spoons, retrieved slowly. Silver or gold on bright days, something darker when it is grey.
A casting bubble lets a spinning rod throw a fly: olive or black woolly bugger, or a small chironomid, with 1.5–2 m of leader behind the bubble.
Lures beat bait in the first days after a truck, when fish are schooled and chasing.
Also in the bag
Needle-nose pliers, and a small long-handled net — the wharf deck sits above the water.
A headlamp from October to February — the walk back to the lot in the last half hour before the gate is in forest.
Your FWID and photo ID.
If you keep fish
A small cooler with ice packs. Bleed and ice right away; stocked rainbows are good eating.
Garbage, guts and line go home with you — this is a drinking-water reserve and bear country.
What you don’t need
A boat, a float tube or waders. None are allowed or useful.
Heavy gear, salmon gear, or a tidal licence.
Best hours, and reading the water
Rice is small enough to walk around in half an hour, so you are never far from wherever the fish are. Stocking-day fish are easy; the trick is everything after the first week.
Timing
The day after a truck, every time. Fresh fish are naive and grouped up near where they were released. Watch the stocking report in October and from mid-March.
Weekday mornings. The gate opens at 6 am and the morning is the bite you can actually use; the evening one is cut off by the gate for half the year.
Overcast and drizzle are good. A bright blue fall afternoon is the slowest time on this lake.
Where the fish sit
Off the wharf — it puts you past the shoreline margin, it has room behind you to cast, and it is the most popular spot for a reason.
Near the release point for the first day or two: fresh fish hang around where the truck emptied them before they spread out.
After a few days, stocked fish spread out and cruise the edges. If nothing has happened in 20 minutes, walk the loop and try another gap in the trees — this lake rewards moving.
Look for rises in the calm mornings. Fish dimpling the surface want something small and slow, not a spinner.
Month by month
When
What’s there
How it fishes
Mid Oct — now
Fall stocking under way — 1,000 in on 8 Oct; ~3,500 more expected
The best stretch of the second half of the year. Fish the day after each truck. Gate at 6 pm, so mornings.
Late Oct — early Nov
Last fall loads, usually 20 Oct – 5 Nov
Lake is at its fullest. Clocks go back on 1 November and the gate goes to 5 pm, which is after sunset.
Nov — Feb
Holdovers from the fall
Slow but genuinely open. Bait fished slowly in the middle of the day. Skim ice in a cold snap ends it until it melts.
Mar — Apr
Spring stocking starts — first loads usually mid-March
The truck comes back and fish are easy again. Gate back to 7 pm, so an after-work session works.
May — Jun
Spring loads keep coming, usually to mid-June
The longest good window of the year. Fish move to cooler water as it warms; early morning gets better and midday worse.
Jul — Sep
Survivors of the spring stocking
Warm, shallow water; the trout sulk. Dawn only, or don’t bother. The gate is open to 9 pm, but the fish aren’t.
Safety and etiquette — a pond in the woods
Wildlife
The reserve is bear country, and fall is when bears feed hardest. A cooler of trout on the wharf is exactly what they are looking for.
Keep fish, food and bait in your pack or in hand, never left on the bank while you walk off.
Metro Vancouver publishes a wildlife page for the reserve; read it once.
Sharing the loop
The trail is shared with walkers, strollers and wheelchairs, often right at the water’s edge. Look behind you before every cast.
The wharf is the busy spot. Two or three rods is a crowd; share it, and don’t cast across someone else’s float.
Kids’ first trout are caught here every weekend. Give them room.
Leave it clean
Pack out every scrap of line. Birds tangle in it, and this lake is in a drinking-water reserve that tolerates anglers rather than needing them.
Don’t move fish or bait between waters, ever.
Two fish is the limit; there is no reason to take more than you will eat.