One Armed Canoe Paddle?

I have never heard of a one armed canoe paddle.

l have seen those in the past. More of a paddle for sculling and keeping the canoe in place when fishing instead of long distance paddling.

That's all for now. Take care and until next time...be well.

snapper

Think it was about 20 years ago I saw a number of them being made, mainly to just keep the canoe straight for fishing.

Here is a picture for those without the face page.

It's not difficult to scull or even paddle slowly forward or backward with a regular paddle properly cradled in one arm. No gimmick paddle is needed.

Nessmuk (a.k.a. George Washington Sears) suggested 'don't neglect the auxiliary paddle, or "pudding stick." as my friends call it ... use the pudding stick, and you can go almost anywhere that a mushrat can' on pages 138-139 of Woodcraft in 1895 as shown below. The full book is available at https://archive.org/details/woodcraft00sear_0/page/138/mode/2up if you want more details.

Benson

Although a very short paddle like a Nessmuk "pudding stick" will eliminate the need to shoulder cradle, that may or may not be an advantage depending on one's paddling skill. Here's a fellow paddling one-armed with what looks like my bent shaft Sawyer Manta.

Just another thing to carry.

I'm with Glenn on this one, just use your single blade paddle with one hand. In the "Woodcraft" book Nessmuk uses the one handed paddle as an alternative to the double blade he used. It was probably his only spare paddle and I imagine it took up less room in his 16 lb canoe than a standard size single blade. I don't see a need for one for single blade paddler that bring a spare paddle.

Nessmuk was sui generis—a 5'-3", 105 lb., tubercular man in his sixties, who was physically weak but a talented writer for Forest and Stream and master story teller.

He commissioned five small and lightweight canoes from Henry Rushton between 1880 and 1885, most weighing in the 11-16 lb. range, and I've read his entire gear pack never exceeded 26 pounds and was sometimes less. I guess that included his pudding stick paddle. His entire ditty bag was a 4" x 6" pouch, including fishing tackle, and he carried only two days of food. He fished and liked to capture and eat frogs. Mostly, however, he dined in the many hotels, camps and supply stores that dotted the main Adirondack routes in the 1880s.

If you want to believe stories. In a letter he wrote to Forest and Stream, published in 1918, 28 years after his death, he wrote: "I smoke and take an occasional glass of wine and never lie about my hunting and fishing exploits more than the occasion seems to demand."

The paddle batch I made in 2024 (and posted here) has a "sculling" one handed paddle for a friend in Louisiana. We went back and forth a bit until I had a good idea of the how and why, including some rough drawing he made