There's a lot more to trolling than dragging a lure through the water. How deep are the fish and what lure runs that deep? Are the fish on some sort of off-shore structure that you cannot see and how do you find it?

Some of the folks who visit this site carry depth finders to help them answer these questions. I don't; too heavy. So, I "figure out" the answers to the above questions myself. By examining the lure, I can make a pretty good determination how deep it will run, given the line I have (as a general rule, lighter line will let a lure run deeper). And by examining the bank, I can get a general idea of how the lake bottom slopes toward deep water. Then, based on time-of-year and what we did yesterday, I can start with an estimate of what species of fish will be where.

Trolling from a canoe is no more risky than anything else you might do in a canoe. If you are not sufficient canoeist to be trolling, you should be in a canoe in the first place.