Will small/shallow rivers damage my kayak?

I have a 12 ft Old Town Dirigo 120. It is brand new and I really like how it looks. I’ve just started using it but the guy at the canoe rental place said that the small river I took it on destroys nicer kayaks and that they have to buy very tough ones to rent out. The river is mostly about 3-5 ft deep throughout but has a few areas where it gets very shallow and my kayak drags on the rocky bottom. Should I avoid rivers like this and stick to lakes or is my boat built to handle that? I don’t want to age my boat any faster than I have to. Thanks!

Congratulations on your wonderful new kayak! It will provide many years of fun and reliable service even with a few scratches and gouges along the way. OT makes very sturdy canoes and kayaks built to last a long time. Use it often and enjoy!

@Andy said:
Congratulations on your wonderful new kayak! It will provide many years of fun and reliable service even with a few scratches and gouges along the way. OT makes very sturdy canoes and kayaks built to last a long time. Use it often and enjoy!

Agree…this shouldn’t be a problem with your boat.

I guess I’m going to take the other view and say that I never intentionally allow any of my boats to contact the bottom of any river, lake, sound, bay, or what have you. I don’t like scratches, or any other marks on my boats. Stuff happens, but it’s not because I don’t try very hard to avoid stuff. That’s just the way I am.

Scratches happen, but if you take a little care to avoid dragging and bumping, they should accrue slowly over many paddles.

Do not deliberately drag your kayak. The rental place guy warned you about scratches because renters almost always drag boats around.

Some scratches won’t hurt the boat in terms of functioning. If that is an insurmountable problem for you this is probably the wrong activity for you.

But you got this boat like a year ago or so. In a rush after you were advised against a 10 footer and got that anyway. It sounds like you haven’t gotten it wet. Why is this an issue now?

Ah, it’s Ohioguy!

I’m getting the popcorn ready.

Uhhh… you need the new worn off that boat. Enjoy it as a boat and not a piece of fine furniture. Yeah, if I had a beautiful strip built boat I’d probably baby it but not plastic or fiberglass. I was fortunate enough to run into an oyster bed early in the life of my fiberglass boat. It hurt at the time but it’s nice to get it over with.

@Celia said:
Some scratches won’t hurt the boat in terms of functioning. If that is an insurmountable problem for you this is probably the wrong activity for you.

But you got this boat like a year ago or so. In a rush after you were advised against a 10 footer and got that anyway. It sounds like you haven’t gotten it wet. Why is this an issue now?

I actually returned it and got the 12 ft remember? And I went through a huge mess with Amazon shipping me 3 damaged boats and ended up not getting a good one until November. It was worth the wait though, as it ended up with discounts only costing me $350. $850 new I’d say I won that round!

Most river bottoms are actually pretty smooth, so not really prone to making a lot of damage on the kayak. Oceans with barnacles and muscles are much harder on bottoms.

So you likely won;t get much in the way of scratches, and as said, these scratches are minor.

If the river is flowing, the big damage can come is you do something wrong and the power of the water pushed the boat hard into a rock at a funny angle.

@Rex said:
Uhhh… you need the new worn off that boat. Enjoy it as a boat and not a piece of fine furniture. Yeah, if I had a beautiful strip built boat I’d probably baby it but not plastic or fiberglass. I was fortunate enough to run into an oyster bed early in the life of my fiberglass boat. It hurt at the time but it’s nice to get it over with.

I agree. In fact. I tell first time builders to drop the kayak on the concrete right after they’ve finished it. Get the grief over early and go enjoy the boat.

Os, that hurt!

Shallow creeks and rivers are the most fun! Wear your battle scars proudly!