Ocarina of Time Lake Hylia Guide: Fire Arrows and the Lab

In Ocarina of Time, you get the Fire Arrows by shooting the sun. There is no chest and no boss. A stone tablet at Lake Hylia reads "When water fills the lake, shoot for the morning light," and Zelda Wiki confirms it means exactly that: stand on the tablet at dawn, put an arrow into the rising sun, and the Fire Arrows drop out of the sky onto an island.

The rest of the lake is a stack of side jobs. Zelda Wiki's Lake Hylia page lists Ruto's bottled letter, the Fire Arrows, the Golden Scale, three Pieces of Heart, the Scarecrow's Song and five Gold Skulltula tokens there, and the Water Temple sits under the water. The Fishing Pond already has its own guide, so this one covers everything else, and the one thing that makes the lake confusing: for most of the adult era it is nearly empty.

Lake Hylia at a glance

The ages and item requirements are from the Ocarina of Time Randomizer's logic file, which spells out what each check needs. The descriptions are Zelda Wiki's and Thonky's.

Two lakes: the child era and the drained one

As a child, the lake is full. Zelda Wiki says it joins Hyrule Field, and that you can also reach it by floating down the river from Gerudo Valley, since all of Hyrule's water runs from Zora's Fountain down through Zora's River and Gerudo Valley into the lake. There is an underwater tunnel to Zora's Domain, and you take it the first time with the Silver Scale on the hunt for Ruto's letter. Our bottle guide and Jabu-Jabu walkthrough cover that errand. The randomizer's map data also gives child Link an owl flight out of the lake back to Hyrule Field.

As an adult, you come back to a lake that is almost drained. Zelda Wiki puts it down to Morpha's curse, the same curse that froze Zora's Domain, and says the tunnel to the Domain is blocked by ice. Thonky describes only a small patch of water left in the middle.

The drained lake changes what you can reach. The randomizer's logic only lets an adult onto the Fishing Pond's island if one of three things is true: the Water Temple is cleared, a Magic Bean plant is there to ride, or Link can call Pierre with the Scarecrow's Song. So the Golden Scale, and the laboratory heart that needs it, normally wait until after Morpha unless you planted a bean by the laboratory as a child.

After Morpha, Sheik tells you the lake is filled with pure water again, and it is. In the original game Zora's Domain stays frozen even so (Zelda Wiki's Morpha page notes the mismatch), which the Switch 2 remake fixes, covered at the end.

That is the main island, with the lake full. Zelda Wiki calls it the largest island, with a lone tree and the Triforce warp that the Serenade of Water drops you on. The Water Temple is underneath it, and most of this guide happens within sight of that tree.

Getting into the Water Temple

Zelda Wiki's Water Temple page gives the standard way in: adult Link, the Iron Boots from the Ice Cavern and the Hookshot. Thonky's walkthrough has you walk into the patch of water left in the middle of the drained lake, put the boots on, sink, and Hookshot the crystal to open the gate (Zelda Wiki calls it the target above the gate). Zelda Wiki's Lake Hylia page has Link make the descent in the Iron Boots and the Zora Tunic, so put the tunic on first.

There is a second way in that the randomizer's logic accepts with no tricks switched on: skip the Iron Boots, dive with the Golden Scale, and hit the gate's switch with the Longshot. Its trick list adds that the plain Hookshot can reach from one particular spot. In a normal game this is trivia, because the Longshot is inside the Water Temple (Zelda Wiki puts it after Dark Link) and the Golden Scale is on an island you mostly cannot reach yet. On a randomizer seed it can matter.

Inside, our Water Temple guide takes over.

The Fire Arrows: shoot the sun

The intended order is straightforward, and the game times it for you.

1. Beat Morpha and take the blue warp. Thonky's walkthrough has the cutscene end with you on the main island, the lake refilled and the sun coming up.
2. Stand on the stone tablet. Zelda Wiki says it is the plaque above the Water Temple's entrance. Thonky puts it as the little stone platform on the east end of the island you are standing on. Reading it gives you the "shoot for the morning light" line.
3. Shoot the sun as it rises. You need the Fairy Bow, which comes from the Forest Temple. Zelda Wiki says the arrow freezes in midair and falls onto an island in the lake.
4. Swim out and pick it up. Thonky's wording is that you swim to the little platform where it landed. That is the Fire Arrows.

If you miss the sunrise, you do not have to wait a whole day. Thonky's fix is to change the time to night and back to day, then shoot while the sun is still near the horizon. The Sun's Song does that for you: Zelda Wiki says it turns night to day or day to night, and the randomizer's map data marks Lake Hylia as a place where time passes, so the clock moves rather than reloading the area.

Can you get them before the Water Temple?

Zelda Wiki says you do not have to finish the Water Temple: the Scarecrow's Song with the Longshot works, and so does a Magic Bean plant. The randomizer's logic is stricter. It accepts the Bow plus either a cleared Water Temple or the Longshot with Pierre, and it does not list the bean for this check.

Read the small print, though. In the normal game the Longshot is a Water Temple item. So the Pierre route gets you the Fire Arrows before Morpha, not before the temple. The bean is the route Zelda Wiki describes for skipping the temple entirely, and it is the one the randomizer's logic leaves out, so treat it as unconfirmed.

What Fire Arrows are actually for

• Magic. Each one costs 2 magic points, per the original manual quoted on Zelda Wiki, so you need the Magic Meter from the Great Fairies.
• Torches out of Din's Fire's reach. That is the first use Zelda Wiki lists.
• Enemies that shrug off arrows. Zelda Wiki notes that Freezards and Anubis ignore normal arrows but take damage from Fire Arrows. That makes them a cleaner answer to the Spirit Temple's Anubis than steering it into a fire trap. ReDeads take no damage from any arrow, Fire Arrows included.

Are they required? Not in the original game, per Zelda Wiki: Din's Fire, or a normal arrow fired through a lit torch, covers the puzzles. The randomizer's logic for the original Ganon's Castle agrees. Its Spirit trial needs the Bow and the Mirror Shield, not Fire Arrows, and every other trial step that can use them also accepts something else, such as Din's Fire, the Longshot or the Hover Boots. Master Quest is different. There, Zelda Wiki says you need Fire Arrows to burn the webs on the ceiling of the Spirit barrier in Ganon's Castle, because Din's Fire cannot reach them, and the randomizer's Master Quest logic requires them for that trial too.

My take: on a first playthrough the blue warp leaves you on the right island at the right time of day anyway. Take the shot.

The Lakeside Laboratory

The crooked building on the bank is the Lakeside Laboratory. Zelda Wiki describes the Lake Scientist inside as a chemist who makes medicine from lake water and counts Granny at the Kakariko potion shop as something like his student.

The diving pool. Zelda Wiki says the pool is eight meters deep, and the scientist calls out how deep you got every time you dive. Touch the bottom and he gives you a Piece of Heart. That takes the Golden Scale from the adult record at the Fishing Pond. The randomizer has no age requirement on it, so once you own the scale either Link can collect the heart. Its trick list does have an opt-in way without the scale: take off the Iron Boots partway through Hookshotting the crate at the bottom.

Under the pool. The randomizer's location list counts three Red Rupees down there, reachable with the Golden Scale or the Iron Boots. The crate on the floor hides a Gold Skulltula. Thonky's route is to sink with the Iron Boots and roll into the crate, and the randomizer wants the Iron Boots and the Hookshot to collect it.

The Eyeball Frog. In the Biggoron's Sword trade, King Zora's frog has to reach the scientist within three minutes or it spoils, per Zelda Wiki's Eyeball Frog page. He is excited to fry it until Link explains it is for Biggoron's eye drops, then makes them, per Zelda Wiki's Lake Scientist page.

The rest is decor. Zelda Wiki mentions a motionless shark in a cage at the bottom of the pool and two tanks on the desk, one of which holds a small octopus-like creature in the N64 version and a frozen Octorok in Ocarina of Time 3D. A Gossip Stone rumor says the Cucco Lady comes here to study how to breed pocket-sized Cuccos.

The roof Piece of Heart

The narrow tower in the screenshot above has a ladder up to a railed lookout, and Zelda Wiki puts a Piece of Heart on that platform. Getting onto the roof is the hard part. The randomizer's logic only gives this heart to an adult, and lists two ways up.

• The Magic Bean. Thonky puts a soft soil patch by the laboratory door. Plant a bean there as a child and ride the plant as an adult. Zelda Wiki's soil table says the same plant carries you to the laboratory roof, the Fishing Pond and the island above the Water Temple, so that one bean opens up the whole drained lake. Beans come from the Bean Seller in Zora's River.
• The Scarecrow's Song. Call Pierre and Hookshot to him (randomizer logic). Zelda Wiki says the roof can be reached this way too.

If you are doing a child-era cleanup trip, plant the bean here. It is the cheapest insurance in the lake.

Bonooru and the Scarecrow's Song

Two scarecrows stand on the shore, Pierre and Bonooru. Bonooru is the one that matters. Zelda Wiki puts him in the soil by a fence, and Thonky says he is the lower of the two.

1. As a child, take out your ocarina in front of Bonooru and play him an eight-note tune. Zelda Wiki's Scarecrow Song page adds that it cannot copy one of the game's other songs or be the same note eight times. Thonky's warning: the song is recorded in real time, so pauses and held notes are part of it. Make it something you can repeat, and write it down.
2. As an adult, play him the same eight notes. He is so pleased he lends you Pierre, per Zelda Wiki. From then on, wherever Navi flies off and turns green, the song makes Pierre pop out of the ground and you can Hookshot to him.

The full note rules and every spot that uses it are in our songs guide. The one Lake Hylia-specific point: do the child half before you pull the Master Sword, or you are making a trip back through time just for this.

All five Gold Skulltulas

Positions are Thonky's. Ages, times and items come from the randomizer's logic, which also has an opt-in trick for the laboratory wall spider: a precise jump slash with a Deku Stick or the Kokiri Sword instead of the Boomerang. For the tree, Thonky's walkthrough Longshots to the top of the tree to land on a high branch, waits for night, then Longshots the spider.

The token rewards are in our Gold Skulltulas guide.

The rest of the shore

• Three Gossip Stones. The randomizer's location list has one by the laboratory and two more to the southeast and southwest.
• A Business Scrub grotto. Zelda Wiki puts the lake's Business Scrubs in a grotto beneath a tombstone, and the randomizer's location list counts three of them. As a child they sell bombs, Deku Nuts and Deku Seeds, and as an adult the seeds are swapped for arrows. Zelda Wiki says Business Scrubs only offer a deal once you make them surrender, which our Lost Woods guide walks through.
• The Fishing Pond sits on its own small island. Its Piece of Heart, the Golden Scale and the Hylian Loach are all in the fishing guide.
• Enemies. Zelda Wiki lists Blue Tektites and Guays. Guays keep coming back, and Zelda Wiki says killing ten makes a larger one spawn.
• The heart in Hyrule Field next door. The Business Scrub who sells a Piece of Heart lives in a grotto near the lake's entrance on N64 and 3DS. It is in our heart pieces guide, and it moved in the remake.

Version differences

• Ocarina of Time 3D. The only 3DS change I found on Zelda Wiki's Lake Hylia and laboratory pages is cosmetic: the frozen Octorok in the laboratory tank. Master Quest redesigns dungeons, not the overworld, but on 3DS it mirrors the whole map, so every east and west above flips.
• The Switch 2 remake. It launched on November 5, 2026. Zelda Wiki's notes on it so far record these changes that touch the lake:
  • Lake Hylia has been merged with Hyrule Field into one map, so there is no loading screen between them.
  • In the adult era, a lot of ice now surrounds the passage to Zora Domain.
  • Zora Domain thaws when Morpha is defeated, which fixes the original's odd frozen Domain beside a refilled lake.
  • Spots where Pierre can be summoned are now marked by swirling straw, and the song is renamed the Scarecrow Song.
  • Inside the Water Temple, the hidden Small Key under the central pagoda is gone, along with the door it opened.

Zelda Wiki does not yet document any change to the sun shot, the laboratory or the lake's Gold Skulltulas. The remake's Gold Skulltula and Heart Piece changes are in our remake collectibles guide, and the rest of the remake is in our Switch 2 remake guide.

Quick Action Checklist

• As a child: teach Bonooru an eight-note song and write it down. Plant a Magic Bean by the laboratory door. Drop a bug in the same soil for a Gold Skulltula.
• Child at night: take the Skulltula on the small square island and, with the Boomerang, the one on the laboratory's back wall.
• First adult visit: the lake is drained. Play Bonooru's song back to get Pierre. Use the Iron Boots and Hookshot to open the Water Temple gate, with the Zora Tunic on.
• After Morpha: stand on the stone tablet at the east end of the main island and shoot the rising sun with the Fairy Bow. Swim to where the arrow lands for the Fire Arrows. Missed it? Sun's Song to night, then back to day.
• Adult at night: Longshot up the dead tree for its Skulltula.
• In the laboratory: sink with the Iron Boots and roll into the crate for a Skulltula. Then dive to the bottom with the Golden Scale for the scientist's Piece of Heart.
• Ride the bean plant, or Hookshot to Pierre, onto the laboratory roof and climb the ladder for the second Piece of Heart.