Lake · Canada
Kootenay Lake
Lake in British Columbia, Canada
- Area
- 422km²
- Average depth
- 179m
- Elevation
- 530m a.s.l.
- Shoreline
- 392km
- Volume
- 75.4km³
Kootenay Lake is a lake in Canada. It covers 422 km². On average it is 179 m deep. Its surface lies 530 m above sea level.
Plan your visit
Stay, sail and get there
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The water
How warm is Kootenay Lake?
The water is warmest in July, around 19 °C at the surface, and coldest in February, around 2 °C. It rarely averages 20 °C, but it stays above 17 °C from July to August: brisk, refreshing swimming.
It does not normally freeze in winter.
On the shore, afternoons reach 22 °C on average in July and -6 °C in December. The driest month is August (26 mm of rain), the wettest November (91 mm).
Average surface temperature measured by the Landsat 8 satellite between 2013 and 2021 at the point furthest from the shore (124 readings). Shallow bays and beaches are often warmer.
From above
The whole lake from space
Month by month
The year at the lake, month by month
Not a forecast: these are averages over many years. Water is the 2013–2021 average; air, rain, sun and wind are the 1991–2020 average.
Water: 2013–2021 averageClimate: 1991–2020 average
| Month | Water°C | Water high°C | Air high°C | Air low°C | Rainmm | Rainy daysdays | Sunh/day | Windkm/h |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| January | 2 | 3 | -6 | -13 | 71 | 16 | 1.9 | 5 |
| February | 2 | 3 | -4 | -14 | 52 | 12 | 4.0 | 6 |
| March | 4 | 5 | -1 | -9 | 78 | 16 | 4.1 | 6 |
| April | 7 | 9 | 5 | -4 | 58 | 14 | 6.1 | 5 |
| May | 12 | 14 | 13 | 2 | 66 | 15 | 7.3 | 6 |
| June | 16 | 18 | 17 | 6 | 82 | 16 | 7.5 | 6 |
| July | 19 | 20 | 22 | 10 | 34 | 9 | 10.9 | 5 |
| August | 19 | 20 | 21 | 9 | 26 | 6 | 9.6 | 5 |
| September | 16 | 18 | 16 | 4 | 44 | 9 | 6.9 | 5 |
| October | 12 | 14 | 7 | -2 | 69 | 12 | 4.2 | 5 |
| November | 8 | 10 | -1 | -8 | 91 | 17 | 1.7 | 5 |
| December | 4 | 6 | -6 | -14 | 79 | 16 | 1.5 | 5 |
Water: LakeTEMP (Landsat 8, 2013–2021). Air, rain, sun and wind: NASA POWER, 1991–2020 averages. A rainy day has at least 1 mm of rain. Sunshine hours are derived from measured solar radiation.
Size & depth
How big, how deep
- On average, water stays in the lake for about 3.2 years before flowing out.
- Its catchment drains 46,402 km² of land.
- About 751 m³ of water flow out every second, on average.
- Its shoreline is 5.4 times longer than a circle of the same area: plenty of bays and inlets.
Around the shore
What's around Kootenay Lake
Counted within 1.5 km of the shoreline in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit.
- 16beaches and swimming spots
Lakeside Beach, Red Sands Nude Beach, Six Mile Beach, 5 Mile Beach, Moyie Beach and 11 more
- 27campsites
Kokanee Chalets RV Park and Campground, Toad Rock Motorcycle Campground, Bernard Beaches, Lakeside Cabins & Campground, Group Campground and 22 more
- —boat hire and water-sport clubs
- 13marinas and slipways
Schroeder Creek Resort Marina, Riondel Boat Club and 11 more
- 5ferry piers
Balfour, Kootenay Bay
- 27viewpoints
Wardner Street Lookout, Canyon Lookout, Pulpit Rock, Fletcher Creek Falls, Lyon's Bluff and 22 more
- 24hotels, B&Bs and chalets
Hume Hotel & Spa, The Lake Hotel, Prestige Lakeside Resort, BW Premier Collection, Kokanee Chalets RV Park and Campground, The Blaylock Mansion and 19 more
- —fishing spots
- 42restaurants and cafés
Towns on the shore
- Nelson10,664 people
- Kaslo1,049 people
Nearest airport with scheduled flights: Castlegar/West Kootenay Regional Airport (YCG), 63 km in a straight line.
Car hire at YXC airport (Cranbrook)Discover Cars · Affiliate linkOpenStreetMap is built by volunteers: when a number is low, it may just mean nobody has mapped it yet.
Photos
Seen by visitors
Recent years
How each month compared
Afternoon high on the shore. The first row is the reference, the 1991–2020 average in °C; the years below show the difference from it: warmer in orange, cooler in blue.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1991–2020 average | -5.5 | -4.5 | -1.0 | 4.6 | 13.3 | 16.9 | 21.9 | 21.3 | 15.7 | 6.9 | -1.3 | -6.5 |
| 2020 | +1.2 | +0.4 | −0.9 | −2.9 | −0.8 | −1.2 | −2.0 | −0.7 | +1.4 | −1.1 | +0.6 | +2.6 |
| 2021 | +1.0 | −2.6 | +0.9 | +2.7 | ±0.0 | +5.0 | +4.4 | −1.0 | −0.3 | ±0.0 | +1.7 | −1.5 |
| 2022 | −0.1 | ±0.0 | +0.6 | −1.1 | −3.4 | −0.6 | +1.0 | +2.8 | +3.1 | +5.7 | −3.7 | −2.3 |
| 2023 | +0.8 | −0.9 | −1.7 | −1.7 | +4.6 | +2.6 | +1.4 | +0.1 | −0.2 | +2.1 | −0.1 | +4.0 |
| 2024 | −1.2 | +1.8 | +0.1 | +0.3 | −1.4 | −0.7 | +2.3 | −0.5 | +2.5 | +0.9 | −1.4 | +2.8 |
| 2025 | −1.6 | −3.1 | +1.2 | −0.8 | +1.4 | +1.6 | −0.6 | −0.2 | +4.3 | −0.2 | +1.7 | +3.8 |
+1 warmer than usual −1 cooler than usual
Nearby
More lakes nearby
United States360 km² · 138 km away21°maxFranklin D. Roosevelt LakeUnited States269 km² · 156 km away21°maxOkanagan LakeCanada349 km² · 213 km away23°maxCoeur D'Alene LakeUnited States126 km² · 204 km away22°maxKalamalka LakeCanada25.6 km² · 204 km away23°maxMoraine LakeCanada0.4 km² · 220 km away10°maxAbout these numbers
| Outline, area, depth, volume | HydroLAKES v1.0 (Messager et al. 2016) · CC BY 4.0 |
|---|---|
| Water temperature and ice | LakeTEMP v1 (Korver et al. 2024), Landsat 8 2013–2021 · CC BY 4.0 |
| Air, rain, sun, wind | NASA POWER, 1991–2020 · public domain |
| Names and description | Wikidata (Q1783875) · CC0 |
| Around the shore | © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL |
| Images | EOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons |
Every figure is an average or a count from a public dataset. Licences and methods: data sources.
