Swamp Girl

You are soooo right about the coastal wind. It blows and blows and blows. I'd fish more if I could, but so many mornings and evenings, it's too windy for my canoes.

Cool!

Brrrrrr! It was six degrees this morning on the coast of Maine, but fishing in 34 degrees is still quite cold...and quite impressive. #hardcore

I get skunked when there's snow on the ground and I'm casting from shore. Granted, I don't cast long in those circumstances. Ten casts and I'm done, but it's good to simply cast.

@A-Jay: A. Nice pike. B. I always admire how neat your boat is. C. And I envy how little your boat moves when a fish is hooked. Muskies especially will take a canoe for a ride, but lmb do too.

Wh-what???!!!??? Full disclosure: I use Whopper Ploppers less and less.

I see you're new here. FWIW, @Team9nine is our resident Crappie God. If he told me to throw a Suick Thriller to catch crappies, I would. Here's a Suick Thriller:

All this talk about BM sent me to his latest YouTube video, where he opened by monetizing his arrest and then proceeded to go fishing with a hangover, chucking bass back into the water as if they weren't living, wonderful animals and letting them flop on a deck full of boat hooks. I couldn't stomach the full video.

It does. Even when I'm having a great morning on a local pond or bog, I still ache for wild places.

@TnRiver46: You're right about the versatility of canoes and their carrying capacity. I can't stand in my canoe and I don't think anyone could other than a balance beam gymnast. It is narrow. And @Susky River Rat is right about canoes being uncool, but I feel pretty cool when I glide over weeds and cast to thick bass. @VolFan, I'll go look at the Native Ultimate right now. Thanks for the lead!

@MediumMouthBass: I watched three YouTube reviews of the Ultralight and was irritated by the reviews. So many who make YouTube reviews are careless with the viewers' time. Get to the point! Like you did above. Your review is far more informative than the ones I watched, so thanks for that. You might remember that I bought a NEXT canoe, which is kayak-y, so I'll fish from that and see if I want to edge into a full fishing kayak.

Thanks for all the thoughtful replies. I thought I'd convince a few to consider a canoe, but now I'm thinking about a kayak. I would like to stand here and there. And the kayak seat sure is attractive. What I can't see myself doing is tricking out a kayak. Here's a lightweight kayak I found: https://www.crescentkayaks.com/product/ultralite-fishing-kayak/ However, it's still 17 pounds heavier than my Kevlar canoe and that's before adding any accessories. 17 more pounds is a lot for me, but I think I could manage it. Car topping it would be the real challenge. Anyway, I learned a lot about why you guys prefer kayaks and bass boat and I appreciate your taking the time to share.

Clickbait reminds me of Stuart's "Look what I can do!" of MadTV, i.e. much ado about nothing:

I feel the same way about road trips, but man, you are going to some classic places, a Mount Rushmore of great water. And @A-Jay is headed back to Nirvana!

That was a thorough, persuasive answer, @MediumMouthBass. Thank you. I agree that each kind of boat has its ideal application and a tricked-out kayak is an attractive option. However, there's no way you could carry your kayak through the woods in northwestern Ontario. You could roll it, but I'm sure your cart would tip again and again as the wheels struck rocks and it would bog down in mud. A portaged canoe would clear the mud and rock. However, if you were willing to struggle mightly, you'd have a great fishing platform once you reached water. I'm too old to worry about what's cool, trendy, or all over social media, but I fear you're right. Agreed! Or it would be nice if someone built a Kevlar fishing kayak. I think I'd miss the 15' 6" of storage in my canoe. The one time I tried a fishing kayak, I found it to be short and cramped. I'm just glad that we have options. Canoes work for me and their Northwoods history also matters to me. I carry the tradition forward. Anyway, thanks for the detailed response, MMB. It lessened my confusion.

I've owned v-hulls, including a 14' Lund with a 10 hp motor, which I used to fish big water like Lakes Superior and Michigan, and several 12-footers with a 6 hp engine, which were great Mississippi River boats. To be frank, I don't miss batteries and oil and gas and electronics and engine noise and yanking that pull cord, again and again and again, one bit. Because I don't need a ramp to launch my canoes, I can fish quiet water where there are no engines, which matters a lot to me. I know for some of you who fish big water, you need a big engine, but if you fished a canoe, you could fish small water where you wouldn't need an engine. Maybe you don't have small water opportunities. In Maine, you don't have to drive far before you see a bog on the side of the road. So, have you ever considered fishing from a canoe? Do you already and if so, where do you use it? If you wouldn't even consider a canoe, why not? Too small? Too tippy? Too slow? Too uncomfy? On the other hand, canoes have taken me to places like this, which is a lake in northwestern Ontario that will never see a bass boat: I literally have caught tens of thousands of lmb, smb, muskies, walleyes, and pike out of canoes. They are fish-catching machines because they're quiet and go everywhere. I'm surprised more of you don't add one to your bag of tools. I know @A-Jay has both a bass boat and a canoe and has used both to outstanding and specific effect. Any others? Lastly, look at the bass in my avatar. She was one of more than ten four-plus-pounders I caught that morning, at a place even a kayak would have been hard-put to reach, unless you're willing to carry your kayak down a steep slope of bowling ball-sized rocks and mud. I could do that with my 32-lb. canoe. #olswampylovesherthreecanoes

Yep. And no Nitro nor Ranger can launch here: So true. Bass boats are above my pay grade, but I'd love to fish out of one just once in my life to experience it. One day, I'd like to buy an aluminum 12' V-hull. It could be 40 years old. And I'd like to mount a modern electric outboard on it. If Nitro decides to sell 40-year old 12' hulls with modern electric outboards, I'm aboard. Until then, Nitros are far beyond my means and Rangers doubly so and even if I owned one, I couldn't tow it and couldn't launch it at any of my ponds/bogs. It would just sit and decay in my driveway like @airshot's neighbor's boat. Maybe @Darth-Baiter, you should consider buying a 12-foot v-hull too. I've caught thousands of bass out of such boats. The hulls cost a few hundred and the motors cost about a thousand. Like @Captain Phil wrote, you can catch bass out of anything that floats. Gim, I've learned over the years that you take no short-cuts other than shortening your screen name. I wish I were more like you. I take so many short-cuts. Look at my canoe above. It's a mess. It's always a mess. To cut myself a little slack, poling through the swamp will forever keeping it from shining.

Don't give up! Keep diving. One day it won't hurt so much. At least that's how it works for me.

I'm guessing Ben and some of his fanboys have read this thread. I think Ben would like it, thinking that "even bad press is good press," but his followers might be less than pleased. I just know that he's clickbaity and clickbait is a pebble in my shoe.

@RHuff: Does locating bait and then casting, understanding that bass are nearby, increase your anticipation? I ask because when I see a bass feeding, my cast to that spot is loaded with anticipation. I'm then guessing that you'd feel that rush much of the time for you're always casting to bait and nearby bass.

I can. You have a heart of gold. So does she. Sometimes Cupid gets it right.

@N Florida Mike: Great trip report, Mike. Ya got me smilin'!

Like @pdxfisher, who's fishing the Columbia in a kayak in December, you're a baaaaaad man too!

Exactly. Apples and oranges. I can see my outfits lying on the bottom.

Gonna be hard to top @Glenn's story!