They have great weight-carrying capacity and most can accommodate more than one person. Canoes are easy to transport and let you get into places inaccessible by other watercraft. And canoes are so quiet that they make it easy to get close to wary fish. For instance, a snook in skinny water is so wary it makes a bonefish look deaf and dumb by comparison, yet often I've been able to get closer than a canoe length to a snook before it spooked. You can fish with almost any canoe, but some are more suitable than others.
Construction materials range from commonplace to exotic, and so do the prices.
With so many variations, the selection process might seem daunting. For our purposes, however, it isn't complicated, but some important considerations must be met. The foremost is stability-how much depends upon your intended use. Stability is primarily a function of beam and bottom shape, but it is also affected by length. Canoes that work best for most anglers range from 13 to 18 feet in length and 34 to 40 inches wide at the point 4 inches above the bottom of the canoe.