Kayak Bass Fishing: The Perfect Outdoor Activity for Anglers

Any time you get out on the water and catch some fish, it’s a good time. However, there are always ways to switch things up and enjoy the sport from a whole new angle.

For most fishermen, especially those stuck on the banks, the dream is typically to get a nice bass boat and sail the lake in style. However, we think there’s an even better way to change things up: Kayaking.

Kayak fishing is nothing new, but you’d be surprised by how many anglers have yet to try it in favor of chasing their dream bass boat. Today, we want to go over what kayak bass fishing is, what advantages it provides over bank and boat fishing, and some tips to help you get the most out of your experience.

Let’s get started.

What is Kayak Bass Fishing?

The name is pretty self-explanatory here. So, we won’t dwell on it too much. Kayak bass fishing is when you hop in a kayak, bring along your gear, and start catching bass. That’s it. It’s just a different way to get into the water.

There are more intricate tidbits that set it apart from other types of fishing, but in general, it’s just fishing from a kayak.

The Advantages of Kayak Bass Fishing

This is where the inclusion of a kayak really increases your fishing experience. There are a ton of benefits for you, the fish, and your fishing experience when you use a kayak, and we're going to go over each one in detail.

Personal Benefits of Kayak Fishing

Your personal health, financial capabilities, and general personal life are probably more important to you than niche fishing benefits and similar topics. So, we’re going to start this off by talking about how kayak fishing benefits you specifically.

1: Improved Physical Health

Any time you get outside and do something, even if it’s just standing by the bank casting, you’re getting at least some physical exercise in. Kayaking increases the quality of that exercise dramatically. While you still get to sit and feel relaxed, you’re powering the kayak entirely with your own muscle power. It’s not intense enough to feel like a hard day at the gym, but it will definitely provide some physical health results the more you get out in your kayak and fish.

This is like combining your favorite hobby with your health needs, and that should be more than enough to convince you to make the switch. It’s not the only benefit, though.

2: Stress Relief

Fishing in general is known as a great stress reliever, but there’s something about gently floating around the lake and taking in the natural sights and sounds that adds to that. Unlike a boat, there are no loud motors or choppy waves distracting you from the peace that comes from being out on the water fishing.

3: Savings

A kayak obviously adds another expense to your fishing “bill”, and you can save a few bucks by just staying on the banks. However, it’s far cheaper than buying a traditional fishing boat, and it provides the majority of boat benefits in a more scaled-down package. So, you can get the boat fishing experience without financing a big bass boat or taking out a second mortgage. Most good kayaks can be purchased for just a little over a grand, and there are even cheaper options in the hundreds.

Benefits for the Environment

Boating isn’t bad for the environment, but there are some inconveniences that cause minor problems, and occasionally, irresponsible behaviors do cause bigger problems for the fish, other anglers, and the local ecosystem.

A kayak gets rid of practically all those problems.

Here’s how.

1: No Noise

If you’ve ever been enjoying a good feeding frenzy just to have a big bass boat fly by with zero consideration for what others are doing, you’re not alone. Everyone loves a little peace and quiet on the water, but we’ve all had to deal with inconsiderate guys in big boats chopping up waves, letting their engines go as loud as possible, and generally disrupting everyone. That doesn’t just disrupt you and scare the fish off. It also disturbs the entire underwater ecosystem.

A kayak doesn’t do any of that. It’s basically silent beyond the soft slap of your paddle when you’re trying to move more quickly. There’s no motor, you’re not going to disrupt anyone else’s experience, and the fish barely notice you’re there. That has a major benefit for your fishing experience, too. We’ll get to that, later.

2: Safer

Any time you’re on the water, regardless of what vessel you’re on, or even if you’re on the bank, there is a certain level of risk. People fall in and drown all the time. On the bank, it’s the least common, but in a boat, there’s a lot of room for error. You can go too fast, hit a hazard, and pollute the water with your boat’s necessary chemicals, fall in and hurt yourself to the point that you can’t get back in on your own, hit surface-swimming fish and animals with your propeller, or otherwise cause a lot of damage.

Obviously, responsible boating practices make those problems a non-issue, but the frequency of problems on the water shows that not everyone is very responsible.

A kayak doesn’t stand a chance of leaking chemicals, you’re not moving fast enough to seriously harm anything you run into, and as long as you wear a safety vest, you’re almost as safe as you are on the bank.

Overall, it’s safer for you, the environment, and other people using the water.

Benefits to Your Fishing Experience

Finally, a kayak provides quite a few benefits for your fishing experience and efficiency. If you’re not convinced, this section is where you’ll probably hop on the bandwagon.

1: Cheap Access to the Water

Like we said earlier, unless you have tens of thousands of dollars to drop on a bass boat, you’re probably stuck on the shoreline fishing from the bank. That means that you can’t access many parts of any given fishery due to vegetation and natural problems preventing you from walking the entire bank, and you obviously can’t cast clear across an entire lake to cover some of the deepest sections.

A kayak fixes that cheaply. For anywhere from $300 to $4000, you can suddenly gain access to every part of a lake safely. This can easily open up a fishing spot you’ve fished at for years and turn it into an entirely new experience. You might also find a previously inaccessible spot that is ripe with high-quality bass.

2: More Mobile Fishing

When you’re bank fishing, if you want to move to a new spot, you have to pick everything up, drag it all the way to the new spot, set it up, and then get back to fishing. Depending on how much you carry and how you carry it, that can be backbreaking. It also wastes a ton of time.

With a kayak, you bring your rod, and everything else is either tied to the kayak or in an onboard compartment depending on the type of kayak you have. You stay in the kayak the whole time, and you can stay on the move.

It’s far easier to cover even a large lake with a kayak than it is to cover a much smaller body of water on foot.

Even with a boat, you’re typically switching between driving and fishing. With a kayak, it’s easy to keep your line in the water and fish as you float around.

3: Highly Customizable Experience

Could you imagine buying a fancy bass boat and then making major changes to it? Especially if it’s financed, that would be a risky proposition.

A $1000 fishing kayak you picked up, have it entirely paid off, and is pretty much bulletproof is a lot easier to customize to your liking.

Whether you’re adding aftermarket parts, drilling ports for rod holders in a cheap basic option, installing onboard sonar, or anything else, it’s fairly easy to do, does little more than increase the quality of your experience, and you don’t feel like you’re potentially destroying a massive investment. Those little customizations also make it easier to locate and catch bass.

4: Flexibility in the Fight

If you’ve ever fought a big bass from the banks, you know how complicated it can get. If you’re on a bank that is incredibly unkempt, or if it’s just difficult to balance on with the rocks, you typically have to get creative with how you fight the bass, and more often than not, you have to settle for muscling it in and hoping it doesn’t work its way around a certain obstacle or overcome your drag too much.

Since a kayak just floats around on the water and is barely any larger than you are, you can fight the bass however you want. If you want to take it slow with a big bass and fight it around a large area, you can do that, or if you need to maneuver away from line-destroying obstacles to make sure you land it, you can do that, too. 

There’s simply far more flexibility when you’re in a kayak compared to bank fishing. Even with a boat, you usually have less flexibility just due to its size and how it maneuvers.

Tips for Kayak Bass Fishing

We’ve hyped kayak bass fishing up throughout this guide as an easy, accessible, and worthwhile way to fish, but we won’t lie. There are some stark differences from what you’re used to whether you normally use a boat or fish from the banks. As such, it might require a little help for you to get into it effectively.

In this section, we’re going to go over some of our top tips to help you hop in a kayak and land big bass faster and more effectively.

Use Sonar:

One of the great benefits of using any vessel is that you can constantly scan the water WHILE you fish. If you use a bank-based sonar unit, you have to cast it out, get a reading, and then fish.

Some fancy kayaks come with sonar unit mounts or mounting holes setup, but even if you get a cheaper basic option, a simple drill and ingenuity will allow you to mount a sonar unit right to the vessel. We highly recommend setting that up.

Go with the Flow:

One big difference you’ll notice is that bigger fish can easily drag your kayak around. You don’t have an anchor, and you’re not very heavy. Go with it. The fish will tire itself out faster, and it makes the fight even easier.

Minimize Gear and Use Tie-Ons:

This is one of the neatest advantages of kayak fishing. You’re not as limited by space as you think you are. It’s easy to get a floating tackle box, a cooler, or a fish basket, and tie them to the kayak. You can then drag your heavier gear around while you go. This is a huge benefit over bank fishing. However, we would recommend getting a kayak with a storage compartment and minimizing the amount of gear you bring along. You know what you’re targeting, and you can easily get away with a small Plano box of lures and your rod in the kayak while bigger items float behind you. 

Use a Vest:

Kayaks are pretty safe, but even if you’re a great swimmer, we recommend wearing a safety vest. It’s a requirement at many fisheries, too. Your kayak can flip, and it can be difficult to get out of it. A floatation vest will help you turn it right-side up and keep you safe.

Get Help from BassForecast:

Finally, the best way you can enhance your new kayak bass fishing experience right off the bat is to download the BassForecast Fishing App.

The BassForecast app brings in-depth tips, weather charts, maps, and a whole community of like-minded anglers to your fingertips. Download it today, and you’ll have the best fishing companion right in your pocket whether you’re on the bank, in a boat, or kayaking around the lake.