Kayak Secuarity

James recent loss brings up a great topic that I'm sure we have all thought about. I haven't seen it discussed on the form. How do we all keep our kayaks safe when we can't see them whither on the beach or on our cars. When I can't see my trailer I put a cable thru the scupper, but I have left it places where it could have been taken. The light weight weight and portability that we Love also makes them easy prey. How do you all deal with this.
Recently Mooch and Jd came up to my place on the river and we stashed our kayaks in the bushes I told them it was cool and I think it was, but in the back of my mind I was a little uneasy.

a big kyryptonite cable through the scuppers is the best you can do, maybe 2 is better.. during the summer i leave my boat on the truck all week sometimes.

I always put mine in the garage when done. I do the master lock cable thru the sculper holes when out and about, but now I think 2 cables are better than one.  I think I'll get the wood burning tool and put my DL# inside the hull, in case I have to ID it sometime..

Craigh

If you are on the beach and can run cables through 2 or more kayaks together it would be a REAL hassle to carry them off.
I even run cables through my Yakima Hull Raisers when I am not around. The cradles we all like to use are only a couple of screw turns from disappearing.
You can go to Home Depot and buy cable to make something the length you need.

the cables through the scuppers seems like it will slow down most casual theft.

I bet 99% of all kayak theft is amateur theft. it's just not going to be lucrative enough for
professionals.

amateur theft is basically crime of opportunity, just don't make it easy and that's
99% of the battle.

Keeping almost honest people honest is the trick and just slowing them down with
a cable will do the job.

stopping a professional is almost impossible. Fortunately I don't see kayak theft
becoming a professional thing. way too bulky!

For many years I had a small doberman that spent a lot of time in my truck and camper.
Better than any alarm system. She was the best. passed away a year ago.

Let what happened to KayakJames be a lesson to all of us.  I agree with everyone above.  A sturdy cable lock will help keep most people honest and provide us with peace of mind.

I'm still surprised how many guys just never lock there kayaks.  Why ask for trouble!

I've never locked my kayak when on my car or at home, just since I've never thought someone would be desperate to steal a 15ft long chunk of plastic... especially since it's not something easily sold.  I do lock it if I'm leaving it somewhere(like at the beach) for a few hours.

Sometimes, people just suck.   

I never locked up my kayaks last year while on top of my vehicle.  My friends always thought I was nuts for not letting my kayaks out of my sight when we would stop to eat or go in the store.  This year I will be locking them up with two fat cables.  Kayak theft will 99% of the time be a crime of opportunity.  They would have to have a bigass pair of bolt cutters, and that would draw a lot of attention to them.  Don't make it easy for them.  I talked to a guy at salt point last year that told me his friend had a kayak stolen off the top of his car from the Mackerricher State Park parking lot.  It could happen anywhere.

Not my words, but very true: Thieves don't like to work, so make it so they have to work to get your stuff.

Cradles & rollers: go get some ss nuts with the nylon lock in them (OSH), I think they're 9/16". Leave the usual knobs on and screw the nuts on top, hide a wrench in your car in case you need to make adjustments.  If you take the knobs off and just use the nuts, it will take much longer to get them off,  a big problem for thieves, and not a problem for you if you always leave them on.

My Prowler came with a serial no. scratched on the outside of the bow.  If you have one, write it down.  Better yet (for reasons that would make your eyes glaze over), take a rubbing of it.  And I like the idea of putting some numbers in a hard to see spot.  It's hard to think of some kind of mark on the outside that would make it easy to spot your yak from a distance and couldn't be removed.  I had a cheap dinghy stolen decades ago and I'm still suspicious of anything that looks remotely like it.  It's no comfort, but getting stuff ripped off is "crime tax".

That is why we need NCKA logos on all our boats. Be easy to spot a brother's boat.

I just recently decided to keep a live, pissed-off - rattle snake "stored" inside my hatch when the yak is not in use......

Seriously = NAME YOUR KAYAKS!!!! Just like the "MOOCH"  I'm actually looking into painting "MOOCH" instead of using stickers on the bow.

Here is a bottom line I have recently learned:
  Don't try to make your morning go quicker don't load your yak the night before just go to bed sooner and get up earlier. If its on a rack don't let it out of your sight we can all speculate what a thieve might or might not steal in my experience nothing is safe just because it is locked doesn't mean it is safe. if a thief want something bad enough he or she will do what it take to get it.

Kayakjames....
That is a tough lesson to learn. I used to load it up the night before, but found I slept much better when I left the kayaks locked snuggly in my garage. I basically load everything else in my vehicle and have that in the garage as well.
My tiedowns are positioned at the end of the garage ready for kayak loading. 

As for when I do need to lock it...say going into a restaurant or something, I use the cable lock through the scupper hole. This won't prevent all theft, but it will as Jmairey said, help the honest people stay honest.

Marc Mc

As for when I do need to lock it...say going into a restaurant or something, I use the cable lock through the scupper hole.

Always a good idea.

I knew a guy that had his brand new mountain bike stolen off his cark rack while he stopped off at a  Burger King.  The sad thing is he that had just bought the bike that same day and was on his way home from the bike shop.  He never even got a chance to ride it.

Just lock it!

another tactic is to buy
used worn out stuff that you hope will got stolen so you can buy something shiny and new, 

to scum-bag thieves:

there's an old used scupper pro on my truck outside my house on occasion. please come by and steal it
so I can then buy Bill's prowler so he can buy a maruader!   
you might get bitten by a dog or shot (or both) due to  old reflexes that die hard, but it's usually not locked!

best,

J