New to kayak fishing…Planning trip to Pawleys Island…Need info on how to deal with current
If you mean slowing your drift while you fish, you can get a length of heavy chain (perhaps 4 - 8 feet) and tie it to perhaps 30 feet of anchor rope (longer for deeper water). Throw it overboard and let it drag on the bottom. Keep a knife handy to cut the line if it gets hung up in a fast current. Otherwise you can go for a swim. If you don’t want to deal with a wet chain in your kayak, consider instead a gallon plastic jug, the kind with a tapered neck. Fill it with sand or pebbles, glue the cap on with marine sealant, tie a rope to the handle and drag it behind the boat. The tapered shape should help keep it from hanging up, but keep a knife ready just in case.
Because you are new to kayak fishing, and apparently to boating in the ocean in general, don’t head out into the ocean by yourself. Inexperienced kayakers in the ocean by themselves end up in the accident or death statistics way too frequently. Hook up with some experienced kayak anglers, learn from them, and don’t go out by yourself until you have considerable experience. And the more experience you have in kayak fishing in the ocean, the more you will recognize the hazards of kayak fishing by yourself. You will of course need a PFD. Practice self rescue (climbing back onto or into your kayak) in a pool or other safe area, and be sure you can recover from a kayak flip quickly and reliably before you even think about going out into the ocean. Find out what immersion gear (i.e. dry suit with appropriate clothing under it or wetsuit) is necessary for your area and season and buy it. Find out what signaling and safety gear (radio, GPS, compass, light, horn, whistle, etc.) is desirable for your area and buy or borrow it. Learn about safe launch sites. Learn about hazards in your area such as currents, reefs, breakers, and rocks. Learn how to safely interact with motorboats who are fishing or crossing in the same area. Learn what range of wind, waves, and other weather you can safely kayak in, given your level of experience.
To respond to your specific question about how to deal with current. If you are heading towards some objective, and the current is moving from left to right at right angles to your desired course, you need to point the nose of your kayak to the left of your objective in order to progress in a straight line towards your objective. The same is true of wind, and the wind and the current will often be pushing you in different directions. If you find that you are drifting to the right of your objective, turn your nose more to the left and keep paddling. If you have a fish finder with GPS features, you can point the direction of travel arrow on the little boat on the screen towards your objective on the screen, and that will keep you traveling straight towards your objective, although depending on the net effect of current and wind, the nose of your kayak will be pointing to the left or right of your objective. You also need to learn about tidal currents, and time your fishing so you go out with a falling tide and get returned to your launch site by a rising tide, rather than fighting the current both ways.
@BrianSnat said:
If you mean slowing your drift while you fish, you can get a length of heavy chain (perhaps 4 - 8 feet) and tie it to perhaps 30 feet of anchor rope (longer for deeper water). Throw it overboard and let it drag on the bottom. Keep a knife handy to cut the line if it gets hung up in a fast current. Otherwise you can go for a swim. If you don’t want to deal with a wet chain in your kayak, consider instead a gallon plastic jug, the kind with a tapered neck. Fill it with sand or pebbles, glue the cap on with marine sealant, tie a rope to the handle and drag it behind the boat. The tapered shape should help keep it from hanging up, but keep a knife ready just in case.
Anchoring in current is a bad idea, even if you have a breakaway anchor system and are using an anchor trolley to keep the bow or stern of your kayak pointing into the current and/or wind. You can get in a lot of trouble very fast if you anchor in current, and if you get dumped out of an anchored kayak, you can get swept away from it by the current. Anchoring in current is an even worse idea if you tie the anchor to the side of your kayak, because your kayak will end up at right angles to the current.
Pawley’s Island is a barrier island separated from the mainland by marsh. Fish the marsh. Get a tide table for the area. Launch at high tide paddle into a main creek look for a smaller creek that flows into the main creek. Idealy it will have a drop of into a hole inn the main creek. It should also drain a lot of the marsh. Stake out. I use a 4ft length of pvc pipe tied to the boat by a length of 550 cord. Ramming the pipe into the marsh muck gives you a pin to hold the boat there. Use dead shrimp, live shrimp, gulp shrimp or other pattern on a cajun Thunder. Throw it out into the current of the escaping tide up current. Let it float down out of the ‘rush’ into the main creek. Pop it once and a while. If you don’t get anything move to another. but stay a while. Don’t get too secure. Tides run 5 ft or more and kayaks can get stuck. Of course it’s winter. You’ll have more difficulty finding fish in this weather. … Leave before all the water gets out. Six hours waiting for tide to come back is miserable.
Sometimes they go up in the marshes to the shallows. The sun warms the mud faster than the deep water. So they go up there to warm up and find shrimp, crabs, etc. Launch at low tide. Follow the current go up the creeks to the flats. Look for wakes, tails, oysters and other fish sign. Approach stealthy. Cast shrimp, fiddler crab or grub arti or live on a jib head ahead of the fish. Twitch once as they approach. Just remember when tide change is and beat feet out before you loose water. Going in at low you will see the bottom better. Remember many times there are pools that hold water at low tide. Just cause you got water where you are don’t mean you’ll be able to get out.
Of course could do the smart thing and hire a kayak fishing guide to show you what’s what at the beginning of your visit. Then go out on your own later. Be sure to tell them that when hiring and most will be helpful.
ps … trolling a swimming grub, minnow, spinner going in may produce a jack, trout or other strike.