Lake Moultrie

Overview

Lake Moultrie, in Berkeley County, is the smaller of the two Santee Cooper lakes and the third largest lake in South Carolina at about 60,400 acres. Dams and dikes hold in more than half of its shoreline. Unlike Lake Marion, most of Moultrie was timbered before it was flooded, but submerged stumps still line its gently sloping shores, so take care in shallow water. Away from shore, most of the open water is 10 to 30 feet deep with plenty of humps and contour breaks, and at its widest the lake spans 14 miles. A marked channel runs from Pinopolis Dam, which has a boat lock, to the Diversion Canal. The 900 acre Hatchery section, sheltered by the remains of an old dike, grows vegetation that holds largemouth bass, pickerel and bream. The St. Stephen Dam has a fish lift that moves American shad and blueback herring upstream. Moultrie shares Lake Marion's striped bass story and its introduced blue and flathead catfish, which grow very large, and largemouth bass and shellcracker are big spring draws. SCDNR lists eight boat ramps and 19 fish attractors.

Regulations

Fishing is not allowed in Lake Moultrie's Hatchery WMA on Saturday mornings and all day on the last Saturday of waterfowl season. Lakes Marion and Moultrie have a trophy rule on large blue catfish, limits on where trotlines, traps and eel pots may be set, a hook size limit, and a largemouth bass minimum length limit. See the South Carolina rules for Lake Moultrie: https://www.dnr.sc.gov/lakes/moultrie/regs.html

Nearby waters

• Lake Marion · 35 km (SC)

More in Berkeley

• Lake Marion (SC)