thought I would start a thread for people to show off their fishing kayaks.
I have been kayak fishing for a couple years now, I find it very relaxing, but also a lesson in preparedness.
The kayak is an older Necky sky, it is a two person boat with an open sit in design.
After a few variations of milk crate based trolling motor mounts I settled on a setup which places the motor towards the front of the boat. It steers quite well except when I need to go hard left as I have to push the stick away from me. I used some nice cedar left over from a project and bolted it through the hull in a flat area that seemed almost made for it. After also attaching the makeshift transom to the crate and wedging the crate under the bow, it made a rock solid platform for my basic minn kota trolling motor. I reversed the handle so I could reach it from the back and put the battery in the crate to balance the weight of the motor. Added a folding stadium seat and a foam pad and I was basically done. I experimented with a few different ways of holding the rods but ended up using scotty rod holders bolted through the hull. Later I added a fish finder and found that the best way of mounting the transducer was to use duct seal to make a "well" inside the hull, fill it with water and push the transducer into it, shooting the signal through the thin plastic. It works great.
The one time I used it in the salt I changed the kayak rod holders out for a single rocket launcher style holder which crossed over the boat from right to left. I used a 3 oz mooching sinker and a small dodger and squirt and caught a bunch of very small salmon at Qualicum beach last year. The biggest was about 2 lbs. The (definitely not saltwater grade) trolling motor worked well, but started to smoke a bit after an hour or two of fighting a 3 kn current!! I'm going to try more saltwater yaking this year, although the 2-3 foot waves were definitely humbling last time.
Here's a picture of the crate setup:
at Elk lake
and one of the many rainbows I caught last year out of the kayak
Next project: Downrigger
I have been kayak fishing for a couple years now, I find it very relaxing, but also a lesson in preparedness.
The kayak is an older Necky sky, it is a two person boat with an open sit in design.
After a few variations of milk crate based trolling motor mounts I settled on a setup which places the motor towards the front of the boat. It steers quite well except when I need to go hard left as I have to push the stick away from me. I used some nice cedar left over from a project and bolted it through the hull in a flat area that seemed almost made for it. After also attaching the makeshift transom to the crate and wedging the crate under the bow, it made a rock solid platform for my basic minn kota trolling motor. I reversed the handle so I could reach it from the back and put the battery in the crate to balance the weight of the motor. Added a folding stadium seat and a foam pad and I was basically done. I experimented with a few different ways of holding the rods but ended up using scotty rod holders bolted through the hull. Later I added a fish finder and found that the best way of mounting the transducer was to use duct seal to make a "well" inside the hull, fill it with water and push the transducer into it, shooting the signal through the thin plastic. It works great.
The one time I used it in the salt I changed the kayak rod holders out for a single rocket launcher style holder which crossed over the boat from right to left. I used a 3 oz mooching sinker and a small dodger and squirt and caught a bunch of very small salmon at Qualicum beach last year. The biggest was about 2 lbs. The (definitely not saltwater grade) trolling motor worked well, but started to smoke a bit after an hour or two of fighting a 3 kn current!! I'm going to try more saltwater yaking this year, although the 2-3 foot waves were definitely humbling last time.
Here's a picture of the crate setup:
at Elk lake
and one of the many rainbows I caught last year out of the kayak
Next project: Downrigger
