If it helps, I never drink my rum and paddle. 
All kidding aside that was well written, and I agree with no comment needed. Well, maybe one, I might come around eventually…yea, probably not.
davbart I couldn’t disagree with you more. I don’t say that to offend you, that comes at the end of this thread. Your conclusions, experiences, and behaviors are far different than mine. Unlike you, I have experienced the unexpected in a class I environment and seen it turn into something else.
Just this year alone I’ve heard a child cry for help when the current swept them into the middle of the river (they were swimming in the river without pfds and weren’t watching the kids). That story ended well. I also had a paddlin’ buddy recount his day on the river where he performed a hand of god and rescue breaths as part of CPR. The truth is HOG, CPR, and a PFD didn’t save this person…but my friend took comfort in knowing that everything that could be done was done. I’m sure the victim didn’t expect to have a heart attack while on the water. The unexpected does happen. It just hasn’t happened to you yet.
I believe that if everyone wore a pfd while paddling that the boating community would experience far fewer fatalities. The data from the uscg that you posted supports my conclusion but it wasn’t the data that swayed me. I applaud efforts where free pfds are available for use for casual paddlers.
I agree it would be beneficial to know the rest of the story (other drowning factors, including boating alone) that the data could tell us and understanding more about mitigating risk is a good thing. Charlie Walbridge does a great job of this in the ww realm.
I do think that it is possible to look at coast guard data more closely. A few years ago I remember reading a rather lengthy pdf file on their data (all boating fatalities) and what it meant. You might try digging a little deeper. It was a link someone had posted on this forum.
You are free to do as you please. To wear or not to wear? that is your question, not mine. For me it is not even a consideration to not wear a pfd when paddling. Personally, I don’t find wearing a pfd to be a hindrance or a big deal. In fact, it would feel very odd to me to not wear one.
For me it is like green eggs and ham. I wear one on the ocean, in a rapid, down a creek. Swamps and streams, brooks, in ponds and lakes. I wear a pfd everywhere!
You don’t want to wear one. I get that. I think that doing so is being a bit careless and you think it is fine. We just disagree. I will still paddle with ya, as long as you wear the pfd. In fact, if you show up without one, then you will most definitely be paddling alone.
If you want someone to teach you how to purchase and adjust a quality pfd that is comfortable, just know that I am up for helping. We can practice swimming in them as well. We can even cool them with water if it is hot or enjoy their warmth if it is cool.
If you want to continue to not wear a pfd when paddling, then you don’t need my help or permission to do that…but the truth is I’m thinkin’ “you’re just not to bright” and are “pretty green” and “ought to stick to the shallows, close to shore” . I assume you’re inexperienced, lack boat control and more of a floater than a paddler. I’m also wondering if I’m going to have to rescue you. Those are my thoughts. Sorry, my thoughts aren’t nicer. That’s just me. I’m old, experienced, and opinionated. Like I said before, do what you want. Nothing will account for “endless variables” on the water but the pfd helps mitigate a lot of them.
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When they died nobody looked for them. People lived in the dark before fire. Then came fire, oil lights, electric.
I could care less if you’re old, experienced and opinionated. I’m all those things too, and find no reason to think less of others or be insulting. Not to mention, being those things doesn’t mean your argument doesn’t need support and proof. Also, you don’t know me, so don’t assume my experiences.
Additionally, your opinionated stance maybe more convincing if I felt you read what I wrote. I never said, “I don’t want to wear a PFD”. Matter of fact, I stated repeatedly that I wear one, and that I don’t in very specific situations. I keep hearing about the “unexpected”, but no one has explained what possible “unexpected” has a remote chance of happening in the situation I described as when I didn’t wear my PFD. I am purposely climbing in and out of my canoe and swimming in warm, lake water rarely above my head. I don’t wear a PFD when I swim, why wear one in between swims just because I happen to be in a canoe?
I have looked at the USCG closer. It does look at more detailed contributing factors to accidents and fatalities when it does that it doesn’t do so by vessel type. I didn’t see it, maybe you could dig into it with your superior experience and provide a supported, objective, convincing argument that actually addresses what I said.
Edit to add: Go to youtube.com and search for and watch Bill Mason’s Path of the Paddle - Quiet Water, and tell me about that inexperienced, lack of boat control, floater Bill was. I have no idea what Bill’s view about PFDs was, but apparently at the time of his filming this movie he didn’t feel “always wear a PFD” was true.
I was thinking about Jack earlier today - he often took this position. I disagreed with him then just like I disagree with you now. Hope he and Nancy are doing well where ever they are.
At this point I’m not even clear what this post is about anymore. Yes - there are more hazardous things that you can do than paddle without a PFD. I think we all know that. So what? Does that justify not wearing a PFD in “in very specific situations”. If so, I disagree. If not, what is this thread about.
165 post and counting…
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I hope they are doing well too. Hopefully, someone chimes in with some info.
It has definitely taken turns that I didn’t expect, and the thread has become about many things.
I’m not sure where you got
Perhaps, I’ve been unclear. But, my OP was pointing out that some situations, personal abilities and plans are so benign and relaxed that the danger they present don’t fit “always wear a PFD”. The repeated response has been that doesn’t exist because of the “unexpected”. I disagreed with my OP and still do because no one has presented any information to convince me otherwise.
That said, it has morphed into other things such as laws and a few other things that I’m not quite clear about myself. Then again, one turn I wish it would have taken is more people discussing paddling alone and why they do it? what risks are they willing to accept and why? how they mitigate those risks? and… If people don’t like the linking of the two, simply ignore it and address the paddling alone.
Not a surprise - no one is ever going present “information to convince you otherwise”. It’s kind of like religion - either you believe it or you don’t. Just like no one will ever convince me not to put on my PFD before getting in my boat - no matter how benign the conditions.
Thought I had addressed that too - wear my PFD, dress for the conditions and paddle well within my skill level. Would I go out and paddle a class III rapid alone? No. Would I go to my local park and play spot? Yes. Would I do a long open water crossing? No. Would I paddle a protected bay? Yes.
As Doggy_Paddler said about 100 posts ago - "We all take calculated risks. We all want to paddle. You do what you can to make the activity safe enough for your own risk level."
Admittedly, it would take a lot to convince me, but I have changed my mind on other things, so it isn’t an impossibility.
You did address it, and thanks. Most didn’t.
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Is this a lawsuit or courtroom? EBT?
PaddleDog52, I’m interested in your comment about irrelevant if you can’t stand up. Literature says it should be test it in water over your head. I know it’s 16 lbs of floatation, but have no clue how much buoyancy it offers. I have been in water with the other styles. But not my kayak vest.
Dave. I can envision being in water where you can stand, such as a firm rock or sand bottom. Unfortunately the upper Chesapeake bay is heavily silted from farming and construction runoff. The mud could suck your water shoes off. I wouldn’t put my feet down even in 2 feet of water if I can help it. This time of the year, large swaths have thick seaweed, and I’d rather float over it than walk through it. Rec boaters often hug the shore and get forced into the open channel because of the seaweed that wraps around your paddle, or they end up in the channel to avoid the numerous people fishing the banks. Those are the obstacles that drove me to open water.
The lake I was swimming in has a beautiful sandy bottom and unlike most lakes in this area it isn’t heavily tannic and tea like.
It’s funny that you mention not wanting to touch bottom. I started using a canoe as a swim platform as a kid. We didn’t want to deal with the muck and weeds in the shallow water, so we’d paddle out to the deeper water and swim.
PJC. A good reminder of how far we’ve come and the dangers people risked. We’re a luck lot. All the same.
Willowleaf. You remind me of the Potomac with the lock dams. Short but powerful. My reason includes the health possibilities. I go all out on every trip regardless of distance. I have no heart issues, bit the potential grows with each passing year.
A few years back, a mother and her young son living in the Annapolis area were playing with a beach ball on their waterfront lawn. I remember the day, I stayed off the water because of high gust wind. I believe out of the north west. Apparently the beach ball blew into the river and headed out to open water. I don’t know why the mother decided to chase a $4.99, beach ball. They jumped in the canoe and were last seen chasing the ball. Days later they were found in separate areas. I don’t recall that the canoe was found. No vests. It reminds me. In the 70s. We had our life jackets in the center of the canoe.
Doggy Paddler is wise. I’ve come to actually enjoy this thread. Because it made me think, and thinking is good. It made me think of the things I did while young. My regimented approach to kayaking is likely from my lack of control in a WW kayak. I.can see it clearly now that I had no vest on. I own that. We all have a sense of danger. I can only decide what is good for me and I have no right to judge. I can advise, but you don’t need my cconsent.
There’s passion in our kayaking experience and there’s passion in the bad things we’ve experienced. Don’t let your passion pursuade you to exceed your limitations or let your bad experiences paralyze your perception.
I thought the topic of the deliberately provocative OP was a challenge to the “definitive ‘musts’ of paddling.”
To expand that topic, I will say that when I began canoeing every summer day in a lake in Maine as a boy 68 years ago, no one worried about whether I wore a PFD or paddled alone, but I was strongly advised never to stand up in a canoe. I don’t think I followed that rule all the time, because I distinctly remember using the canoe as a diving platform. I did always have a flotation cushion to sit on.
As an adult, I’ve worn a PFD about 95% of the time, the exceptions being shallow, calm and warm waters close to shore on hot days when younger.
No standing is a good rule in certain circumstances. In fact, the only time I’ve ever dumped in flat water as an adult was when I stood up in a Lotus BJX, which has a 25" waterline. It was a cold February day in 1984 in the Catskill Mountains, and I was alone on a leisurely river. The shore was never more than 15 feet away, but I wasn’t dressed for immersion, and it was the only time I’ve gotten hypothermia. Lesson learned.
The vast majority of the flat water and mild water paddling I’ve done in my life has been alone, whether day paddles – which is what this site mostly concerns – but also as a quasi-wilderness tripper. Many real wilderness trippers go far, far from civilization alone, and have done so for centuries, long before PLB’s and sat phones. That’s surely a bigger risk than not wearing a PFD in a duck pond.
In my experience, all the “definitive musts” not only of paddling, but of life, have reasonable exceptions under certain circumstances.
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Thanks, that was well said; accurately making my point better than I did. I should have recognized how “provocative” my post was, and worded it more like yours.
OK - if you want to talk about “musts” and “must nots”, not standing in a canoe is definitely one that I disagree with. There is a whole canoeing discipline built around standing in a canoe - poling. It can be tough on people:
It can be tough on boats:
But it is a blast and I still do it. Not as often as some of my friends, but I do like poling.
Here’s one that always gets people going, You must have bow and stern lines in addition to straps when tying down your boat on the car. I’ll use a bow line if I’m traveling on the highway, but probably not if I’m staying local. I never use a stern line.
I do have to say, though, that you did compare wilderness tripping alone to not wearing a PFD in a duckpond, like somehow one justifies the other. They are separate risk decisions. Am I crazy to put on a PFD in a duck pond one day, and try to stand up in a canoe while running a rapid the next - probably. But those are the risk decisions that I make. At least I wear a helmet.
I won’t speak for @Glenn_MacGrady because as his post shows he’s more than capable of speaking for himself. However, in my mind the comparison of the two situations isn’t to justify one with the other, but rather to show how those who hold the absolute in the one because “risk” aren’t entirely consistent by accepting a greater “risk” in the other. In other words, as seen in this thread some are adamant, almost militant, derisive, and want the force of law to enforce their absolute of “always” while inconsistently accepting a greater risk in another area.
The point isn’t to say you’re crazy for wearing a PFD in a duck pond. It is to say I’m not crazy or “irresponsible” or " a danger to myself and others", etc…, if I don’t.
OK - if you paddle in a duck pond I won’t think you are “crazy” or “irresponsible” or " a danger to myself and others", etc… for not wearing a PFD.
Don’t know about you, but I rarely paddle in duck ponds, and I suspect that you rarely paddle in them either. The whole point of risk management is to be as prepared as you can for the unexpected - and putting on a PFD is a simple way to do that. If you are in a low risk situation and decide not to put on a PFD that is your decision - not one that I would make, not one that I would encourage, but still your decision. I’m OK with that, and I have said that from the start. The good news is that 99.999999999999999…% of the time you will be fine, and paddlers are pretty good at managing risk for themselves as shown by the low accident rate.
I guess my whole problem with this debate is when does the “duck pond” become something other than a “duck pond”. If we knew what was going to happen in advance, it wouldn’t be unexpected.
(p.s. - I can make exceptions to the “must” and “must not” rules for many things, but I guess I just have a problem making an exception for PFD’s - don’t take it personal)
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I don’t think you called me any of those things, and the names really don’t bother me that much. I’ve been called worse by better. The real problem with name calling (ad hominem) is that it isn’t debate or discussion it is simply name calling. What bothers me more is that there are people who are so entrenched in their “must” that they’re willing to have and advocating for a law.
I don’t paddle in duck ponds, but I do regularly paddle and swim the bay lakes of eastern North Carolina such as Lake Waccamaw last Saturday. Bay lakes are shallow, oval shaped lakes. Lake Waccamaw is one of the larger ones with about a 16 mile circumference and the greatest depth is 11 feet. The lake has a no wake zone around the entire perimeter and depth in this zone rarely exceeds 5 ft depending on water level. It has a very predictable wind pattern which makes it popular with sailors. This wind is generally limited to and builds throughout the afternoon. So, not a duck pond, but maybe a large duck pond.
Certainly, I paddle and have paddled much more “dangerous” waters, but as I said the situation is part of what I see as risk management which you mentioned. That may be where some of the disconnect is, to me risk assessment and management is not just determining the risk, but what likelihood of the risk is and mitigation of those risks. I think in the “always” statement you’re removing assessment of the likelihood step and incorrectly making “not wearing a PFD” a risk, misrepresenting what the mitigation (wearing a PFD) mitigates.