Lake · Canada
Rice Lake
Lake in Northumberland and Peterborough Counties, Ontario, Canada
- Area
- 95.4km²
- Average depth
- 14m
- Elevation
- 184m a.s.l.
- Shoreline
- 166km
- Volume
- 1.4km³
Rice Lake is a lake in Canada. It covers 95.4 km². On average it is 14 m deep. Its surface lies 184 m above sea level.
Plan your visit
Stay, sail and get there
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The water
How warm is Rice Lake?
The water is warmest in August, around 24 °C at the surface, and coldest in January, around 0 °C. The surface averages 20 °C or more from June to September: comfortable for most swimmers.
The lake usually freezes over for about 123 days a year, from around 29 November to 31 March.
On the shore, afternoons reach 25 °C on average in July and -2 °C in January. The driest month is February (52 mm of rain), the wettest April (73 mm).
Average surface temperature measured by the Landsat 8 satellite between 2013 and 2021 at the point furthest from the shore (66 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 | Ice | — | -2 | -8 | 58 | 13 | 2.7 | 22 |
| February | Ice | — | -1 | -8 | 52 | 10 | 4.1 | 22 |
| March | Ice | — | 3 | -4 | 54 | 11 | 5.8 | 19 |
| April | 4 | 9 | 9 | 1 | 73 | 12 | 6.2 | 17 |
| May | 13 | 17 | 15 | 7 | 69 | 12 | 7.4 | 14 |
| June | 20 | 22 | 21 | 14 | 69 | 13 | 8.2 | 13 |
| July | 24 | 24 | 25 | 18 | 70 | 13 | 8.8 | 13 |
| August | 24 | 24 | 25 | 18 | 58 | 12 | 7.8 | 14 |
| September | 20 | 22 | 22 | 14 | 64 | 11 | 6.7 | 14 |
| October | 13 | 17 | 14 | 8 | 72 | 13 | 3.8 | 18 |
| November | 4 | 8 | 7 | 2 | 64 | 12 | 2.7 | 19 |
| December | Ice | — | 2 | -4 | 70 | 13 | 1.9 | 20 |
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 5 months before flowing out.
- Its catchment drains 9,414 km² of land.
- About 113 m³ of water flow out every second, on average.
- Its shoreline is 4.8 times longer than a circle of the same area: plenty of bays and inlets.
Around the shore
What's around Rice Lake
Counted within 1.5 km of the shoreline in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit.
- —beaches and swimming spots
- 21campsites
Birdsall Beach Resort, Heritage Park, Shady Acres Camping & Cottages, Golden Beach Resort, Stoney Point Trailer Park and 16 more
- —boat hire and water-sport clubs
- 25marinas and slipways
Harris Boat Works, Sandy Bay Boat Launch, Curtis Point Boat Launch, Ingham Road Boat Launch, Merrill Road Boat Launch and 20 more
- —ferry piers
- 1viewpoints
- 3hotels, B&Bs and chalets
Alpine resort cottages, Sunshine Cove Cottages, Harmony Dawn Retreat Centre
- —fishing spots
- 5restaurants and cafés
Nearest airport with scheduled flights: Peterborough Regional Airport (YPQ), 16 km in a straight line.
Car hire at YTZ airport (Toronto)Discover Cars · Affiliate linkOpenStreetMap is built by volunteers: when a number is low, it may just mean nobody has mapped it yet.
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 | -1.5 | -1.2 | 3.0 | 9.0 | 15.2 | 21.1 | 25.4 | 25.2 | 21.5 | 13.8 | 7.2 | 1.5 |
| 2020 | +2.3 | +0.8 | +2.5 | −0.8 | −0.7 | +2.4 | +3.1 | +1.1 | −0.5 | −0.5 | +2.2 | +0.9 |
| 2021 | +1.1 | −1.0 | +3.0 | +0.7 | +1.2 | +2.0 | −0.7 | +2.1 | +1.1 | +3.0 | +0.4 | +2.4 |
| 2022 | −1.4 | +0.6 | +0.6 | −0.3 | +1.9 | +0.7 | +0.4 | +1.3 | −0.3 | +0.7 | +1.1 | +0.5 |
| 2023 | +2.4 | +2.6 | +0.5 | +1.5 | +1.4 | +1.1 | +0.7 | −0.6 | +1.5 | +2.2 | +0.1 | +2.6 |
| 2024 | +1.4 | +4.0 | +3.0 | +1.5 | +2.9 | +1.4 | +1.0 | +0.3 | +1.5 | +2.1 | +2.3 | +0.4 |
| 2025 | −0.4 | −0.9 | +2.0 | +0.5 | −0.2 | +1.1 | +2.0 | +0.9 | +1.1 | +2.0 | −1.0 | −1.1 |
+1 warmer than usual −1 cooler than usual
Nearby
More lakes nearby
United States19,347 km² · 84 km away22°maxLake SimcoeCanada767 km² · 101 km away21°maxCanandaigua LakeUnited States42.0 km² · 168 km away24°maxSeneca LakeUnited States174 km² · 191 km away24°maxCayuga LakeUnited States171 km² · 196 km away24°maxOneida LakeUnited States207 km² · 214 km away24°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 (Q1548883) · 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.
