Kayak Fishing: How To Choose The Right Paddle For YOU

what's going on salt strong nation today i want to talk to you guys about choosing the right type of paddle for kayak fishing and this is not going to be a one size fits all type of answer there's not one paddle that's going to work best for everybody but we're going to talk about multiple different brands today as well as different paddle designs to help you guys choose what would be best for you and like i said this is a very complex process there's a lot of variables that go into paddle selection for example it might be different depending on the length of your kayak the width of your kayak how tall you are what type of materials you want in your paddle what you're willing to compromise on in terms of price because you really do get what you pay for when it comes to choosing a paddle higher quality paddles are typically going to cost more and lower quality paddles are going to cost less but there's certain features that you might want in a higher quality paddle that you aren't going to get when it's below a certain price point so we're going to talk about every type of paddle today the cheap ones the really expensive ones and what ones are going to work best for the type of fishing that you do so let's go ahead and dive in so let's talk about the most important part of kayak paddle selection first and that's blade design this is really where it all starts this is where your energy is getting transferred from the paddle into the water and it's propelling your kayak forward and the design of that blade is really going to heavily influence how fast your kayak can turn how fast it can move forward the fatigue that's going to happen on your shoulders and arms that design is such a huge part of the paddle and i see a lot of people just completely neglect choosing paddles based on the type of fishing that they do now to talk about a wide verse a thin blade essentially a thin blade is going to allow less fatigue on your shoulders and your arms it's just a more efficient way of paddling but you're not going to be getting power and speed as much as you would with a wider paddle typically the thin paddles are going to be used in racing and things like that so you don't see a lot of kayak anglers using them because we are not doing a constant type of paddling we are typically going in short bursts maybe paddling half a mile getting to a spot fishing it for a little while and then picking our paddle up and going again and that's more suited for a wider paddles because what we're doing is we're allowing ourselves more power with each stroke it allows us to turn better get a little bit more agility because the wider paddle is going to grab more water and it's going to push us in the direction we want to go whether that's we're turning or we're going forward but it is going to cause a little bit more fatigue on our shoulders and our arms because we're having to displace more water so finding a balance in the type of fishing you're doing having maybe even multiple paddles for different types of trips if you know you're going to be traveling two to three miles on one trip just in one direction before you even get to your first spot you might want to look for a little bit of a thinner paddle much like the one that i have here this is a medium spread right here this is what i really like for when i'm just traveling and in fact this is what i have on my pedal kayak just because i know i'm not really using my paddle too much but if my pedal drive was to break down or i was in some shallower water maybe up on the flats that i knew i wasn't traveling a really long distance this medium wet width is really just all i'm going to need but when i used a kayak that did not have a pedal drive system i had a very wide paddle i had the car style predator it was a fantastic paddle i really really liked it and it got me everywhere that i wanted to go very quickly i was able to cover a lot of ground very fast the only downside of it was it was very taxing on my shoulders and my arms just because i was having to displace a lot of water and those wide blades are good when you're in some heavy current and you're you know needing to turn and adjust yourself before a cast but they are not the best for covering really really long distances i would say it would probably be better to pick up one of these if you know you're just going to be paddling i would say that this would be outperformed by the car style if you know you were in heavy current trying to fish or if you were trying to move between several spots really quickly in a small area so really fine tuning your blade selection for the type of paddle that you want can really really be helpful if you don't want to wear yourself down it's going to allow you to make more casts if you're not as tired you're going to be more comfortable out on the water and if you're comfortable out on the water you're going to fish longer and that's essentially just going to help you catch more fish but now let's talk a little bit about the shaft there's a lot of different shafts out there and really tiredness is something that's going to come into play if you pick a lower quality shaft because typically they're going to be heavier and the higher quality shafts that are a little bit more expensive typically are lighter and they're going to help you control your paddle a little bit more without putting as much fatigue on your shoulders now that car style predator did have a fiberglass shaft it was extremely light i really really liked it and this one is a aluminum shaft it's a little bit heavier but again i'm not using this paddle as much now that i have a pedal drive so that doesn't matter too much but really the two recommendations i have for paddle shafts when choosing a paddle for kayak fishing are either going to be aluminum or fiberglass i think if you choose any other material i really would not go with a wooden shaft or a plastic shaft those can really break down quickly the wooden shafts just really aren't great considering you're going to get splinters and stuff i don't recommend those at all i would really really recommend that you get an aluminum or a fiberglass shaft again the aluminum is going to cost a little bit less but it's going to be a little bit heavier put a little bit more tax on your arms and the fiberglass is a lot lighter but it is going to be a little bit more expensive so again pros and cons of those as well so now let's talk about choosing the right materials for the blade and the shaft as there is a little bit of crossover which ones you're going to want to avoid and which ones you might be willing to spend a little bit more money on to have their added benefits now i want to talk about the blade materials first because this again is the working end of your paddle so it's probably the most important there's really three categories of materials that you're going to find in most paddle blades and the first of which is plastic or nylon this is going to be your cheapest and there is some plastic that is better than others again with the cheapest paddles that you can buy at you know walmart target some of those basic retailer stores they are not going to have a lot of strength to them they're going to have a lot of give which is really really bad because as you go to have that energy transfer when you pull your paddle the blade will actually straighten out and you're not going to get all of what you put into that pole in terms of distance so as it straightens out you're going to lose some water that you're displacing it's not going to propel you forward as far so what you're looking for in a paddle is that it has as much hold as it can as much strength as it can so that when you put energy in you're getting energy out you're moving yourself as much as you can so going with the plastic or nylon is not the best move because it does not have a lot of strength to it and you're going to lose a lot of power now moving on to the fiberglass this is the middle of the line a little bit more expensive this actually is a good crossover right here this is fiberglass reinforced nylon so it's a little bit stronger plastic that is reinforced with fiberglass but the fiberglass blades that i've had really are much better than this they don't have any give it all this one doesn't have too much give it's a good again middle of the line paddle but the fiberglass paddles are just fantastic you can displace a lot of water there's almost zero give um but there is a class above fiberglass and that is carbon fiber now i would say they probably have the same amount of strength they're not going to have much give to them but the carbon fiber is a little bit lighter which again is going to help with fatigue on your shoulders and your arms so it's really just understanding whether you want to pay a little bit more to have a little bit less fatigue i wouldn't say that it's going to help you too much i personally have not used the carbon fiber paddles but from everyone i've talked to they are very similar in terms of power and resistance to the fiberglass but they are a lot lighter so it's really just dependent on what you're willing to spend so now to talk about the three materials we're going to have when we look at kayak paddle shafts and again the materials are going to be priced upon how light they are typically the lighter the more expensive because the lighter an object is the less fatigue it's going to cause on you as you use it so at the lowest end of the spectrum we have an aluminum shaft and these really are not all that bad i don't see too much of a difference when you step up to fiberglass which is the next on the ladder we'll talk about in a second but the biggest complaint i get with the aluminum shaft is that they absorb the outside temperature too much so if it's very hot outside it almost hurts you it almost burns you uh to touch it and if it's very cold outside it almost numbs your hands because it's so cold doesn't make you want to reel too much but that's really why you see a lot of people using gloves when they paddle just because that aluminum shaft which is what most paddles have can actually absorb the temperature a lot and affect you quite a bit now with the fiberglass shafts that doesn't happen as much and they are a little bit lighter so a little bit less fatigue but not enough to where i would see a significant price increase being worth it and a lot of times i've seen the shafts alone change the price in a paddle uh up to 50 to 60 and i do not believe that it's really worth it that much it's more the blade that i would be willing to pay more for so that's my personal opinion on it and then at the top of that ladder you've got carbon fiber which i have not used and i cannot speak to whether it would be worth the price increase but from what i understand it's much more expensive than fiberglass and the shaft itself would be much lighter so it could provide less fatigue and from the people that have spoke to again it is a lot lighter and it could be worth it i can't provide personal anecdote to that that's really all the materials you would have to decide between a kayak shaft so now to talk about choosing the right length of paddle this is very important because you may have you know the carbon fiber shaft carbon fiber blade best blade design out there but if you choose the wrong length of paddle it's going to be a very inefficient paddle because on each stroke you're going to be bumping the side of your kayak if it's too short if it's too long you're going to be putting a lot of fatigue on yourself there's a lot that goes into choosing the correct length but it's really determined on how tall you are and how wide your kayak is that way you can properly size that paddle now i am including a universal sizing chart for paddles i would use this as a guide rather than a buying recommendation because each brand is going to have very slight differences whether it be canon or accent perception even car style all those brands if it's a good name brand typically have a sizing chart on their website and i would recommend if you do know which one you're going to buy you go there and look at it before you make the determination of the exact paddle you're going to buy just because you want it to be as efficient as possible and the rule of thumb i've always lived by if you're unsure and you cannot find a sizing chart is that typically i want to just be able to wrap my fingers around the top of the paddle if it's standing straight up but i don't want my palm to be able to come over the top that tells me that it's too short if i can't reach my fingers over it's too long and if my my palm is able to touch over the top uh it's a little bit too short now again i would really recommend finding a sizing chart most paddle shops also will have one on hand so if you are picking it up in person typically those guys will be able to help you out as well but this is a very important part of choosing the correct paddle so kayak paddle manufacturers are becoming very innovative with the things that they choose to include on kayak not only shafts the blades as well there's a lot of new features that are being added some things that are worth mentioning to keep an eye out for is these rulers that are on the shafts these are invaluable i don't see why every paddle doesn't have these on here this one is actually laser engraved so i don't have to worry about it coming off some of them are you know stickered on i would recommend getting ones that are laser engraved but this is just extremely helpful if i forget my bump board at home and i want to measure a fish or i want to measure leader that i'm about to tie on or i want to know the depth of an area that i'm in i also have to know the actual length over here as well but it's a very very useful tool and i would really recommend if the option is available that you get one that has the ruler on the back of it now i am also starting to see some blades that have different tools integrated on them the first of which is a little hook keeper that's on the top of these blades that allows you to dislodge your lure from mangrove leaves or oysters that you know it might have been caught up in you just need to put the hook keeper on the line run your paddle down and dislodge your lure now something else i've started to see and i've not tested yet whether it you know affects the speed of paddling at all is the teeth that are added to the edge of a paddle as you're seeing here and what that does is it really helps with launching or pushing off of things you know if you're near rocks or you're trying to stop yourself from running into something or shorelines anything like that that you need to push off of these flat edges of these paddles often will slip as you go to go push them off and it can be a little bit frustrating but those serrated teeth really help get a grab on what it is you're trying to push off of and it's just really effective for just trying to move away from things or put yourself in a certain type of position with your paddle itself so those are just a couple features to keep an eye out for but that pretty much wraps up everything you need to know for selecting a paddle for the type of kayak fishing you're going to be doing i hope this video was helpful for you guys and if you want to know what you can do to improve yourself to become a better kayak angler again the paddle is just a small tool in your tool set it's not going to help you catch any more fish knowledge will help you do that and in fact we do have a ton of awesome info for you in the salt strong insider club on top of helping you become a better inshore angler we're gonna help you save up to 20 off on the top of the line industry tackle and gear so guys thanks again for watching and i hope to see you guys in the insider [Music] by community or with your family lives all strong in weather lines a day

Channel: Salt Strong

Views: 7,923

Keywords: kayak fishing, how to choose the best paddle for kayak fishing, best kayak fishing paddle, choose kayak paddle, pick kayak paddle, saltwater kayak fishing, inshore kayak fishing

Id: u_d20KUaa1A

Length: 12min 46sec (766 seconds)

Published: Wed Oct 14 2020