No separate New Lake entry appears in the current Region 4 synopsis, so the regional stillwater defaults apply: trout/char daily quota 5 (no more than 1 rainbow or cutthroat over 50 cm), bass and yellow perch closed, and a freshwater licence is required for anglers 16 and over. Confirm the current synopsis before you fish.

Provincial stocking records give New Lake a watershed code identical to Jim Smith Lake's, a few kilometres south, which sits at the head of Jim Smith Creek above Joseph Creek and the St. Mary River. A 1961 limnological survey of lakes in the southern Rocky Mountain Trench measured New Lake at a maximum depth of 10.4 m, averaging 3.4 m across the basin, a genuinely shallow lake with a surface pH of 8.7. That survey also puts the surface area higher than the current lake gazetteer figure, so treat the exact shoreline and size as unconfirmed until a modern survey settles it.

The release record is the best guide to what is actually in New Lake. Rainbow trout carried the bulk of it, 77 releases totalling roughly 332,700 fish between 1940 and 2016, several of them Premier-strain fish from the same Premier Lake broodstock program that seeds much of the East Kootenay. Westslope cutthroat trout appear only at the very start of the record, 35,000 fish over two releases in 1932 and 1933, and brook trout were added for a decade in the 1980s, 22,000 fish between 1982 and 1991. The last recorded release, in April 2016, was 1,000 Fraser Valley-strain rainbow trout planted as spring catchables. Nothing has gone in since, so any fish holding in the lake today are older holdovers rather than a fresh cohort.

Because the lake is shallow from shore to basin, there is no deep water to search out: the whole column sits within easy chironomid range. Work a chironomid or small leech pattern under an indicator, the same small-lake stillwater approach (chironomid under an indicator) that covers most of the region's other put-and-take lakes, and go in expecting an older rainbow or brook trout holdover rather than a freshly stocked fish.

For an angler judging whether the drive is worth it, the release history below is the fishing report. Provincial hatchery records run from 1932 to 2016 and log 89 releases into New Lake, totalling roughly 389,700 fish across rainbow, westslope cutthroat and brook trout.

Rainbow trout carried almost the whole program (about 332,700 fish, 1940-2016), drawing on strains from Premier, Pennask, Dragon, Beaver, Knouff and Gerrard Creek lakes among others. Cutthroat and brook trout were both short-lived additions, cutthroat only in 1932-1933 and brook trout through the 1980s, and neither has been stocked since. With no release recorded after 2016, New Lake now reads as a wound-down put-and-take fishery rather than an active one.

No boat launch, parking area or trailhead has been confirmed for New Lake; check locally before planning a trip. No separate New Lake entry appears in the current Region 4 (Kootenay) synopsis, so the regional stillwater defaults apply.