Fishing kayaks are increasingly popular around the world. Whether it’s salty, fresh or north-south water, you’ll find a kayak in a sporting goods store or a tackle shop. Even online forums are full of fishing kayak images in which fishermen chase finned water creatures.
Kayaks are more portable and less costly than traditional fishing boats, and more stable than canoes. They’re also usable in small water points in urban areas. As a result, the kayak industry is experiencing an explosion of manufacturers. They’re producing high quality fishing kayaks for use in varied application areas, ranging from open oceans to the smallest creeks.
Although customers have a variety of kayaks to choose from, selecting the right product can be difficult and confusing. Therefore, it becomes important to know what to look for in a fishing kayak that can meet all your needs.
With $1,000 to $3,000, serious anglers can easily get a high quality fishing kayak, explaining why they’ve increased in popularity over the last 10 years. They’re portable and easy to launch, giving access to waters blocked from fishing.
The most recent fishing kayaks are versatile, and offer great fishability and angling efficiency.
Advantages Over Shore Fishing
Easy Access to Deep Waters
Kayaks allow anglers to gain easy access to waterways and deep waters unlike shore fishing. This is one of the features that define Fishing kayak’s worth. That also helps catch bigger fish in the deep waters. On the other hand, shore fishing allows catching of smaller fish that often tend to avoid the deep sea for safety.
Versatile Use
Kayaks are usable in almost all kinds of water bodies for catching all kinds of fish species and other water creatures. Whether you fish in the ocean, lake, river, pool or pond, you’re bound to catch bass, pike, muskie, panfish, walleye and striped bass. However, in shore fishing, you can only catch the types of fish available along the shoreline.
Portability
Kayaks are easy to move around from one place or water body to another. Unlike shore fishing where you can only catch fish and other water creatures from the shoreline, you can move across the waters to find the right spot for angling.
Exploring Areas Around the Water Body
With a kayak, you can paddle from one part of a water body in search of fish to catch. Similarly, as you explore the waters on your kayak, you engage in some form of adventure. There’s no boundary to where you can travel or access from a kayak. On the converse, shore fishing involves catching fish from a single location, making it had to engage in any kind of exploration or adventure.
Advantages Over a Fishing Boat
Kayaks are increasingly more popular than boat fishing among anglers. Although boats can cover more water, anglers have more gains with fishing kayaks. The benefits range from enjoying quiet moments in water to earning more money from fishing.
Some benefits of using a kayak for fishing over boats include:
Increased Water Access
It takes a boat ramp to launch a boat in the water. On the converse, kayaks can be easily launched almost from anywhere with access to the shoreline. They also ensure that kayak transportation and loading is easy, even on rough surfaces.
Moreover, boats require deep and large water bodies to operate. They can easily access streams, lakes, ponds and backwaters to access areas with fish that call for less experience in fishing pressure.
More Economical Than Boats
The cost of maintaining a boat in terms of fuel consumed, and buying price is increasingly costly. Unpowered watercrafts such as kayaks do not require any maintenance. The extra money you’d spend on a boat goes into accessories and tackle for your kayak. Moreover, kayaks don’t require registration in most states, further saving you more money.
Kayaks don’t require fuel, rendering them more economical than boats. The latter can cost thousands of dollars in case a problem arises and causes damage. With all the costs involved in maintaining a boat and fixing issues, angling would become worthless and way over your fishing budget.
Improves Angling Skills
Kayaks don’t just give access to more water, but allow anglers to stay in one fishing area for a quality catch. With time, unlike boot fishing, it improves angling skills.
Quiet Time In the Waters
Fishing kayaks allow for quiet fishing times in the water. The quiet movement and low profile of kayaks allow anglers to reconnect with Mother Nature while sneaking up on wary water creatures or fish. With silence, you’re bound to catch a lot of fish. Poling minimizes noise while supporting discreet moves on spooky or wary fish.
Easy Customization
Despite your kayak brand, you can customize it to your specific needs and fishing style. While some kayaks are bare-boned, others come fully kitted out. With increased use of kayaks, innovative storage solutions and accessories are continuously being invented and introduced onto the market to meet your unique needs. They increase water productivity and come with added convenience.
A Few Inspirational Catches From a Kayak
Most kayak anglers install a graph to increase their chance of finding and catching fish. Walker Smith of Wired2Fish’s shares how a slick track mount supports receiving various accessories and a fish finder without damaging the kayak with drilling holes.
He owns the Humminbird HELIX 7 Fish Finder that easily slides onto his Old Town Predator PDL or off. It’s self-contained and takes about 15 minutes to get to his kayak installed with electronics for easy fish location in depth waters.
Smith’s kayaks also develop custom contour maps to help with angling in small water bodies such pools and rivers. Increased portability supports easy unloading and loading for use in other canoes, kayaks or boats.
Conclusion
With the many benefits that come with using kayaks for fishing, every angler has a reason to opt for it over other vessels for fishing. Kayaks are the vessels you need for versatile fishing over different water bodies to catch all kinds of fish.
Clearly, getting a fishing kayak is worth your money, time and effort.