What is the best chain pickerel lake in Delaware?

Red Mill Pond tops our ranking of Delaware chain pickerel waters — 8 ft max depth. Silver Lake and Lake Como round out the top three.

How many lakes in Delaware have chain pickerel?

DepthScout maps 5 Delaware waters holding chain pickerel, 0 of them with real state-agency depth surveys. The deepest is Silver Lake at 12 ft.

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Best chain pickerel lakes in Delaware

5 Delaware waters hold chain pickerel. Ranked below by size and depth-data quality — open any water to see exactly where to fish it: depth contours, scored spots with plain-English reasons, seasonal windows and bait picks. The eastern esox — a lie-in-wait weed-bed assassin that bites all year, including through the ice.

Red Mill Pond — 8 ft max · Largemouth Bass, Crappie, Bluegill, Chain PickerelWhy #1: mapped size signal; contours are approximated · no verified access record attached
Silver Lake — 12 ft max · Largemouth Bass, Crappie, Bluegill, Channel CatfishWhy #2: mapped size signal; contours are approximated · no verified access record attached
Lake Como — 8 ft max · Largemouth Bass, Crappie, Bluegill, Channel CatfishWhy #3: mapped size signal; contours are approximated · no verified access record attached
Andrews Lake — 10 ft max · Largemouth Bass, Crappie, Bluegill, Channel CatfishWhy #4: mapped size signal; contours are approximated · no verified access record attached
Silver Lake (Milford) — 10 ft max · Largemouth Bass, Crappie, Bluegill, Channel CatfishWhy #5: mapped size signal; contours are approximated · no verified access record attached

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How to use this ranking

The order is a map-planning ranking, not a claim about today's fish population. It favors larger mapped waters and gives survey-backed contours a three-times data-quality boost. Agency population surveys, current regulations, access and recent conditions should make the final decision.

Compare maximum depth across 37,233 lake records · See Delaware waters with public access data

When to fish chain pickerel in Delaware

Spring 2–10 ft — Early spawner: post-spawn fish prowl warming, weedy bays and eat everything that moves.
Summer 3–15 ft — Classic ambush game: weed edges, pad fields and dock shade — flashy, steady retrieves.
Fall 4–15 ft — Feeding hard around the last green weeds as water cools.
Winter 5–18 ft — One of ice fishing's most reliable biters — shiners on tip-ups over weed flats.

Also in Delaware: best largemouth bass lakes · best crappie lakes · best bluegill lakes · best channel catfish lakes · best yellow perch lakes · best common carp lakes

Chain Pickerel elsewhere: Québec · Maine · New Hampshire · New York · Massachusetts · New Brunswick · Connecticut · Vermont · Nova Scotia · New Jersey · Rhode Island