Standing In Kayaks And Canoes, And Other Stuff

[Al Agnew]

Vonreed's post about looking for a kayak he can stand in to fish prompted this post...

I've never quite understood the wish some people have to stand in canoes and kayaks. In my experience, there are two main problems with standing. One, you can't control the craft as well while standing (gotta bend down to pick up the paddle, need either a double blade or a very long paddle to do anything while standing), and two, any kind of unexpected bump into something in current can result in a header out of the craft. I stand occasionally in my canoes, either to check out an unfamiliar riffle before I plunge into it, or to stretch my legs if it's not convenient to paddle over to the bank to do so. But I never stand while fishing. I understand the wish for a higher vantage point, but I've never really seen the need for one, and standing does make you more visible to the fish. I do have a higher vantage point anyway than anyone sitting in a kayak, or even the average canoe, since I raise my canoe seat a couple inches from the factory position, to where it's almost even with the gunwales.

If you're used to fishing from a boat where you stand all the time, or even just sit high, fishing from a kayak or canoe can feel awkward and disadvantaged. But the answer, it seems to me, is not to routinely try to stand in the canoe or kayak, but to get used to sitting. Trust me, you get used to it and you become just as effective as standing. Even fly fishing is pretty easily doable while sitting. After all, if you wade and fly fish, sitting in a canoe or from a higher hybrid kayak seat position is about the same as standing in water to mid-thigh, a level that most fly fishermen cast from all the time.

About that controlling your craft. I've watched a lot of people fishing in rivers from canoes and kayaks. The less experienced tend to let their craft rotate a lot. They are drifting down the river, casting to likely banks, but the boat never stays straight. They want to make all those casts to all those spots, and they kinda let the boat go until it's turned facing away from the bank they're fishing, and they are craned around in an awkward position still trying to fish, until they have to put down the rod and spend some time and effort turning it back around. And pretty soon it's doing it again.

The more experienced anglers keep the paddle handy, and take the few seconds of time to hit a stroke to straighten the craft as soon as it starts to get out of position. It's almost like an ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure. One quick stroke can correct the craft just as it starts to turn, but once it turns, it takes several more powerful strokes to get it straight again. It's why the less experienced seem to be working themselves to death trying to control the craft and fish at the same time, and some never get better at it, which is part of why they always prefer to get out of the craft to fish when possible. While the experienced seem to be fishing and controlling the craft effortlessly.

To that end, it's one reason why I much prefer a canoe and a single blade paddle to a kayak and double blade. With the single blade, most of those quick corrective/preventative strokes are done one handed, never having to put down the rod. And unlike a quick corrective stroke with the double blade, which is almost limited to a forward sweep or backward sweep, I can do all kinds of little one handed strokes, including pries, draws, bow draws, stern draws, cross draws, sculling draws, along with the backstrokes, back sweeps, forward stokes, forward sweeps that are the basic corrective strokes. All that terminology isn't quite as complicated as it sounds. Basically, you're simply wanting to move the bow left, bow right, stern left, stern right (yes, you can move one end of the canoe without much effect on the other end), move the whole craft sideways to left or right without turning it, or turn it left or right while moving forward or backward. After a while, you figure out what works to do each thing, not to mention WHEN you need to do each thing, without thinking much about what you're doing.

When fishing in current, you're much more likely to be wanting to slow down than to speed up. Which is why various backstrokes are the most useful part of your inventory. Novices don't seem to know anything but how to make a forward stroke to move the craft to the left or right. Forward strokes in current not only speed you up when you don't want to, but if you're not already going at the speed of the current, they don't do much to actually turn the craft. As an aside, because I meant this to be about fishing and not running riffles, but the worst advice ever given in a book about Ozark streams was in Oz Hawksley's original "Missouri Ozark Waterways", the book that MDC put out for many years until they finally updated it into their present book. He said that to control a craft in current you must be paddling faster than the current. Doing that in curving riffles with sweeper trees or other obstacles on the outside of the bend is the WORST thing you can do. I can categorically say that I NEVER paddle a riffle faster than the current unless it's a very, very easy riffle. Almost everything I do in a riffle or rapid is some variation of a backstroke.

And almost every corrective stroke I do in current will be some variation of a backstroke, as well. You want a stroke to do two things: whatever positioning you want to do, and slowing the craft or stopping it in the current so you have more time to make a few casts.

Let me describe some of the things I do almost automatically while fishing in current from a solo canoe.

First, in smooth, straight current, I always want the canoe to be parallel to the current. That way, the current can work on it less, and I can stop it much more quickly and easily. But no paddle craft really wants to stay straight forever without attention. Sooner or later, due to some puff of wind, vagary of current, or even the way you lean, it will start to turn one way or the other. If it turns toward the bank you're fishing, you can let it go a bit, because it actually temporarily puts you in a better fishing position. But if it starts to turn away from that bank, you want to correct it immediately, because the more it turns, the worse off you are. So if it starts to turn to the right, you grab the paddle in your free hand and make a corrective stroke.

Now...one advantage I have over some is that I'm usually fishing with baitcasting tackle, and I long, long ago taught myself to cast left handed. So it will be my right arm that's free to pick up the paddle, and my right arm is a little stronger than my left. So if the canoe starts that turn to the right, I grab the paddle, and reach back behind me to insert the blade in the water back near the stern of the canoe, out away from the side of the canoe, with the blade parallel to the side of the canoe. And then I draw the paddle in toward the canoe. That's a stern draw, and it pulls the stern to the right, thus straightening the canoe. If the canoe starts to turn to the left, I again reach back behind me, again paddle blade parallel to the side of the canoe, but this time I insert it right up against the canoe and push outward, moving the stern to the left, a stern pry. Remember, when the craft has just started to turn, it doesn't take much to straighten it, and while these one handed strokes aren't very powerful, you don't need much if you do it early. The real beauty of these strokes is that they don't have any forward component, so they don't speed up the canoe like a quick forward stroke on the side the canoe is starting to turn would do.

An alternative in the same situation is, if the canoe is turning right, to reach far forward and do a bow pry, and if it's turning left, reach forward and do a bow draw. All you're wanting to do is move the bow or the stern sideways to straighten the craft, and moving either end accomplishes it. Draws are usually a little stronger than pries, so sometimes if the canoe is turning right, I prefer a stern draw, and if it's turning left, a bow draw. But there are reasons for choosing a pry over a draw. For instance, if the canoe is not only starting to turn right, and also is starting to drift a little closer to the right bank where I'm fishing, I want to do a stroke that will not only correct the turn but also move the canoe slightly away from the bank, at least to slow or stop the drift toward the bank. So in that case, if I did a stern draw on the right side to straighten the canoe, it would be moving the stern farther to the right and thus contributing to the canoe drifting to the right. So I'd instead do a bow pry, which moves the bow AWAY from that right bank while straightening it.

Now let's say I'm in fast current, fishing hard. The canoe starts to turn to the right again. Now, I want my stroke to not only correct the angle, but also do double duty in slowing the canoe down. I need a strong backstroke on my left. If I'm quick about it, before the canoe gets well out of position, a cross stroke will do the job. Paddle in my right hand, I turn my torso, reach across in front of me, and insert the paddle on the left side, as far around behind my seat position as I can, with the blade at about a 45 degree angle to the side of the canoe, and do a backstroke from there. If I need more power, I might lay the rod down and do a "real" backstroke on the left, but that's only if I've let the canoe get too far out of position.

If the canoe is turning to the left, then a simple backstroke on the right is all I need, but it works best if I reach well behind me to start it, and finish it before the blade gets even with my body.

Now let's say I'm in that fast current, and I want to move the canoe to a different line in the current to the left or right, such as when I see that if I let the canoe stay on its present line, I'm soon going to crash into something. So say I want to move to a line to the left. This time, with paddle again in my right hand without putting down the rod, I reach back behind and do a kind of cross between a stern pry and a backstroke, pushing the blade toward the front of the canoe and also at an angle outwards. It slows the canoe and turns the stern to the left. Now I'm in a position to ferry; my bow is pointing where I DON'T want to go. One or two straight backstrokes on the right at this point, with paddle starting not far behind my seat position and ending ahead of the seat position, usually completes the ferry, but if those strokes turn the canoe too much, I might need one more stroke, a cross backstroke like I described above, after the first simple backstroke. But the ferry will move the whole canoe to the left into a different current line and away from the obstacle I don't want to hit. Once it's into the line I want, a quick stern draw on the right straightens it back out in that line.

One more little example...say the current is a little slower, but I want to change lines again, maybe to get the canoe a little closer to the bank or farther away, or maybe to avoid a downstream obstacle. The canoe is straight already or nearly so, and it's not moving too fast. If I want to move it to the right, toward my paddle hand side, I can use a sculling draw. You insert the paddle as vertically as possible, even with your body and out a bit away from the side of the canoe, and with blade parallel to the canoe. And then you scull it. If you don't know what sculling is, you're doing almost a figure eight movement with the paddle, changing the blade angle slightly with each curve of the figure eight, and never removing it from the water until you've achieved the change of line. You're basically pulling the canoe toward the paddle like any draw, but never bringing the paddle out of the water so it's a sustained draw, and it's actually one of the most powerful one-handed strokes you can do.

Now, in describing all this, it sounds like the paddle is ALWAYS in my right hand, but that's not it at all. I do a lot of these strokes left handed as well. It always seems to me to be quicker to switch hands with the rod without setting it down, and pick up the paddle with my left hand, than to actually set the rod down, when you have to worry about being careful so your lure doesn't end up entangled in something. The paddle is ALWAYS in a position where it's within instant reach. I always have the paddle lying with the shaft end on my thigh, and angled forward so that the blade is hanging off the gunwales in front of my other knee. Find the right balance point and it will stay there, but let too much of the blade end hang off and it might slide off into the water. Let too little of the blade end hang off and it will continually drip water in the canoe. But with experience you almost automatically have it lying exactly right. It's within easy reach of either hand. Whichever hand I pick it up with, I end up laying it back down so the shaft is on the thigh on that side.

One more thing...if you're using that single blade one-handed, holding it correctly is important to getting the most of your strokes. Grasp the paddle far enough down the shaft that you can tuck the handle at the top of the shaft under your armpit loosely. That's important. The shaft should run right up the inside of your straight arm, staying in contact with the inside of your forearm and upper arm. Your hand never leaves that spot on the paddle, but to do some strokes it helps to shift your grip slightly, as I'll explain. Your arm stays straight throughout all strokes. You use this grip to do a bow pry (inserting the paddle near the front part of the canoe and pushing outward away from the canoe), a stern draw (inserting the paddle behind you and away from the stern of the canoe and pulling the paddle inwards), a stern pry (inserting the paddle behind you and pushing outward), a basic pry (inserting the paddle to the side of your position close to the canoe and pushing outwards). You can also do a cross pry behind you with this grip (rotating your torso and inserting the paddle on the other side, as far behind your seat position and as close to the side of the canoe as possible, and pushing outward), as well as a cross backstroke (same torso rotation, inserting paddle behind your position and pushing it forward), and a cross draw forward of your seat position (rotate torso, insert paddle away from the canoe side and in front of you, and pull inward).

But to do a bow draw (inserting paddle away from the canoe side and in front of you, and pulling inward), a basic draw (insert paddle away from the canoe side and even with your seat and pull inward), and a sculling draw, you need to turn your wrist so that the thumb side of your wrist is facing inward, with the paddle shaft coming out from under your armpit to rest on the back and outside of your bicep. This is a little difficult to describe, but when you try it you'll know what feels right.

In every stroke, there is a power face to the paddle blade. That's the side of the blade that the water is pushing against, or to put it another way, it's the side of the blade that faces in the direction you're moving the paddle. In all these strokes I've described, either the back of your wrist or the thumb side of your wrist is lined up with the power face of the blade. Every stroke is either moving in the direction of the back of your wrist, or in the direction of the thumb side of your wrist. When you switch wrist positions, you may also have to rotate the paddle shaft slightly so that the power face is turned into the direction of the stroke. The upper shaft of the paddle is always braced either against the inner part of the your upper arm, or the back and outside of your upper arm. If you try a stroke with your wrist in the wrong position or moving in the wrong direction, there is no bracing and your wrist just bends and you lose all power. Remember that all strokes are done with the power and movement of your shoulder alone.

Other than the part about standing up in the craft, the preceding is an idea for a small segment of a book I've been writing on fishing Ozark streams, and would be illustrated with diagrams making all of it a little clearer. Hope you find it helpful to your floating experience.

[fishinwrench]

Looking forward to the book, Al, and I'm glad you said "small segment" cuz paddling instruction is not something I think you can teach in text, illustrations, or even in video format. It has to be FELT to be understood, so IMO it's not worth wasting paper and ink on unless your motive is for folks to one day FEEL IT and think to themselves ....."ahhh, THAT'S what he was talking about!"

[Gavin]

Quite a write up Al...controlling a boat solo is always a challenge....some great tips...seems I always need some more practice...at least till I settle in after the first couple miles.

[Mitch f]

You always seem to be going perfectly straight and all I can see is the splashing of the fish you are reeling in!

I would think for a novice the temptation to cast is usually greater than the desire to correct, so they spend the rest of their fishing careers doing the wrong thing. If they would just teach themselves the correct way in the beginning, they will get at least twice as many casts, and the cast they do get will be from a better position. I guess the stability of a kayak is what makes them popular, because they are definitely more stable than a canoe. However I know the solo canoe has many more advantages once you get used to the instability.

Regarding Oz Hawksley's comment, I can mostly only relate to a jet boat. The scariest scenario for me is going downstream at a slow speed and encountering a hard turn around a rock or rootwad... the current is usually trying to funnel you right at the obstacle. In this case you need to be going faster than the current (because reverse is almost never an option) so you have the ability to maneuver. However this situation is a catch 22. You want to be going fast enough to barely have the boat up on plane so you can still maneuver, but slow enough so if you do crash, no one gets hurt badly. But in any case you need to be going slightly faster than the current. I'm actually thinking about getting a whale tail (thanks Corey) this year so I can be up on plane a little easier and remain on plane at a slightly slower speed, giving you a extra second or two to react. Now, traveling up stream is always less stressful, because your boat has the current to "grab" and you always have extra control, even at zero ground speed.

The un-stealthiness of a jet boat is just something I've gotten used to over the years.... what visual advantage you might gain hampers you when approaching a good fish holding spot. I have just learned to live with it...in a bigger river they have so many other advantages though!

[Al Agnew]

Looking forward to the book, Al, and I'm glad you said "small segment" cuz paddling instruction is not something I think you can teach in text, illustrations, or even in video format. It has to be FELT to be understood, so IMO it's not worth wasting paper and ink on unless your motive is for folks to one day FEEL IT and think to themselves ....."ahhh, THAT'S what he was talking about!"

You're right, pictures are better than words but there's no substitute for doing it. But like you said, I wanted to let people know how much is possible to do with one hand while fishing, and how much you can control a solo paddle craft.

But in so many ways, paddling becomes intuitive. You push the paddle in this direction to make this part of the canoe move in this direction. Maybe the biggest thing you can figure out is to look upon a paddle stroke as pushing or pulling the canoe to the spot on the water where your paddle is, rather than moving the paddle in the "correct" direction through the water. The paddle doesn't actually move much through the water, the canoe moves. Strokes don't have to be, and seldom are, straight forward or straight back. The complication comes in the fact that the current is always affecting the canoe, too, so your strokes have to take that into account and work with the current or modify or minimize what the current is doing,

[Al Agnew]

You always seem to be going perfectly straight and all I can see is the splashing of the fish you are reeling in!

I would think for a novice the temptation to cast is usually greater than the desire to correct, so they spend the rest of their fishing careers doing the wrong thing. If they would just teach themselves the correct way in the beginning, they will get at least twice as many casts, and the cast they do get will be from a better position. I guess the stability of a kayak is what makes them popular, because they are definitely more stable than a canoe. However I know the solo canoe has many more advantages once you get used to the instability.

Regarding Oz Hawksley's comment, I can mostly only relate to a jet boat. The scariest scenario for me is going downstream at a slow speed and encountering a hard turn around a rock or rootwad... the current is usually trying to funnel you right at the obstacle. In this case you need to be going faster than the current (because reverse is almost never an option) so you have the ability to maneuver. However this situation is a catch 22. You want to be going fast enough to barely have the boat up on plane so you can still maneuver, but slow enough so if you do crash, no one gets hurt badly. But in any case you need to be going slightly faster than the current. I'm actually thinking about getting a whale tail (thanks Corey) this year so I can be up on plane a little easier and remain on plane at a slightly slower speed, giving you a extra second or two to react. Now, traveling up stream is always less stressful, because your boat has the current to "grab" and you always have extra control, even at zero ground speed.

The un-stealthiness of a jet boat is just something I've gotten used to over the years.... what visual advantage you might gain hampers you when approaching a good fish holding spot. I have just learned to live with it...in a bigger river they have so many other advantages though!

You're totally right on the nuances of running a jetboat. You don't have the choice of going slower than the current when going downstream, and in reality you have to go MUCH faster than the current to even stay on plane. Those obstacles seem to come up on you really fast when you're in a paddle boat drifting downstream, so in a jetboat they are on you seemingly in an instant. And couple that with the fact that a jetboat tends to slide on turns, just like you were driving a car on ice, so you can't depend upon precisely making a sharp turn, you have to kinda know how fast you can go and how sharp you can turn before it starts skidding, and whether you have room and can make the "turn into the skid" once it starts to go. In some water levels, that rocky riffle right below Sand Ford is the classic example, because you've got a narrow channel with a sudden turn at the downstream end. Turn too soon and you hit a rock, turn too late or don't control the skid and you run up on a rock bar on the other side. Seems like I'm always running my jetboat with my butt puckered.

[DaveMac]

Great post, Al. I know you said this was about fishing and not canoeing, but because traversing riffles is such an integral part of the process of fishing Ozark streams, can you elaborate on the proper technique of controlling (steering) the craft while going down a riffle? I have to admit my error of using speed to avoid obstacles on the outside bend : )

[Wayne SW/MO]

In current I think the first thing to learn is to put the stern where it will keep the bow out of trouble. It's easier to control the end you're in because it has a short turn radius and paddling back is just easier when you need quick corrections. To ferry is nothing more then controlling the stern.

[Old plug]

In my younger day I used to fish the Meramec river a lot from the bird nest to Onandaga Cave. At that time there was a old man that was a true ozarkian. Lived his entire life and raised his family in a log cabin on a hill above Onandaga. He used to make these real float boats that were very narrow but up to over 20 ft long. He used to build them then set them in the river and they would about mostly sink until the boards swelled and you could bail them out. They were nothing but a fine river boat for floating. Those boats were HEAVY. As heavy as they were you could set those things through a riffle easier than a canoe any day. They had a sluggish response to that I felt comfortable with. It was slow but smooth. I had a 18 ft freighter canoe years later that I never liked as well as those old wooden boats. Worst thing about them as far as I am concerned was getting them onto a flatbed trailor for a haul back.

[Al Agnew]

Guys, I'm a little embarrassed...when I described the way to hold the paddle one-handed, I THOUGHT that was how I held it, but in experimenting on the pond next to the house today, I found that it's NOT the way I hold the paddle. So here's a clarification and correction, and I'll also edit the original post. You can't do a stroke in one direction with any power the way I had you holding the paddle:

Grasp the paddle far enough down the shaft that you can tuck the handle at the top of the shaft under your armpit loosely. That's important. The shaft should run right up the inside of your straight arm, staying in contact with the inside of your forearm and upper arm. Your hand never leaves that spot on the paddle, but to do some strokes it helps to shift your grip slightly, as I'll explain. Your arm stays straight throughout all strokes. You use this grip to do a bow pry (inserting the paddle near the front part of the canoe and pushing outward away from the canoe), a stern draw (inserting the paddle behind you and away from the stern of the canoe and pulling the paddle inwards), a stern pry (inserting the paddle behind you and pushing outward), a basic pry (inserting the paddle to the side of your position close to the canoe and pushing outwards). You can also do a cross pry behind you with this grip (rotating your torso and inserting the paddle on the other side, as far behind your seat position and as close to the side of the canoe as possible, and pushing outward), as well as a cross backstroke (same torso rotation, inserting paddle behind your position and pushing it forward), and a cross draw forward of your seat position (rotate torso, insert paddle away from the canoe side and in front of you, and pull inward).

But to do a bow draw (inserting paddle away from the canoe side and in front of you, and pulling inward), a basic draw (insert paddle away from the canoe side and even with your seat and pull inward), and a sculling draw, you need to turn your wrist so that the thumb side of your wrist is facing inward, with the paddle shaft coming out from under your armpit to rest on the back and outside of your bicep. This is a little difficult to describe, but when you try it you'll know what feels right.

In every stroke, there is a power face to the paddle blade. That's the side of the blade that the water is pushing against, or to put it another way, it's the side of the blade that faces in the direction you're moving the paddle. In all these strokes I've described, either the back of your wrist or the thumb side of your wrist is lined up with the power face of the blade. Every stroke is either moving in the direction of the back of your wrist, or in the direction of the thumb side of your wrist. When you switch wrist positions, you may also have to rotate the paddle shaft slightly so that the power face is turned into the direction of the stroke. The upper shaft of the paddle is always braced either against the inner part of the your upper arm, or the back and outside of your upper arm. If you try a stroke with your wrist in the wrong position or moving in the wrong direction, there is no bracing and your wrist just bends and you lose all power. Remember that all strokes are done with the power and movement of your shoulder alone.