Tips for Taking Kids Fishing – and Having FUN!

You’re planning to take a kid fishing? Sweet! Nothing’s better than seeing a kid’s eyes light up at their first catch, and you’ll feel great knowing you’ve helped mint a new angler. But when you’re taking kids fishing a slight attitude adjustment may be in order. You need to make them, not catching a trophy, the focus of the day. Here are some tips that will help make sure the experience is a good one.

1. Target fish that bite often and bite fast, even if they’re small. Bottom fish are often the best bet, since they tend to feed all day even when the tide may be slow or the sun’s high in the sky.
2. Stick with bait fishing, rather than lures. You may be used to twitching that rod tip just so, but for a kid, mastering the art of making an artificial lure look alive is a stretch. So even if your preferred method of fishing is tossing lure, unless there’s a red-hot bite going off consider keeping things simple and dropping baits to the bottom.
3. Keep the trip relatively short. Kids have short attention spans, and in most cases, a few hours aboard the boat is all they can handle before getting fidgety. Rather than trying to fight nature, go with the flow and don’t try to force a full day on the water.
4. If the wind’s blowing or it’s raining, be quick to postpone the trip. Again, don’t try to fight nature. You want the youngster’s first fishing experience to be a good one, not a man-versus-nature battle against the elements.
5. Pack plenty of snacks. Kids get hungry faster than adults do, and if you don’t have munchies close at hand their attitude can sour in a heartbeat.

Will putting all these tips into practice guarantee a good experience? Nope. But they will stack the deck in your favor. That said, if things aren’t working out be quick to shift gears and do something else, like swimming or pulling them around behind the boat on a tube. Remember: make the kids, not catching a trophy, the focus of the day.