Bass Fishing With Kids

I'm looking for some wisdom from the forum. At what age did you introduce your kids to bass fishing? I've got two little girls, a 4 year old and 1 year old. One of my biggest hopes in life is that one or both of these girls wind up loving to fish with Dad. The oldest one caught her first Bluegill before you she was 2, and she could cast by herself around the age of three. All that said, if you want to ruin a good day of bass fishing try and take a 4 year old out on a boat. It's heartbreaking to head out by yourself though when you've got to walk past a little one with tears in their eyes because they can't come along.

I want my kids to love fishing, so I want their early experiences to be great ones. That just doesn't mix well with bass fishing. So how do you guys balance everything? I work a ton and get very few chances to fish per month. Also, at what age were you able to start enjoyably bass fishing with your children?

when you take them out on the boat to bass fish, you have to be committed to them. patience is the key. i had to learn this over time. anytime they are in the boat, your concentration needs to be on them (helping with casting, technique, setting the hook, etc.). my son is 7 now, and fishes Basschamps with me. Reason being is for the experience for him, not to win any money. He is in awe at every tournament, and is excited enough the week before the tournament that his teacher at school has asked me to quit telling him about it beforehand (his concentration at school is tough with hyperactive type behavior). But it really takes me out of the game and I cant concentrate like I should if I were fishing for money. if we get lucky and cash a check, awesome-
I could show you years worth of pictures. I put Blake in the boat when he was 3, with a hookless lure to get him accustomed to casting. Then we moved to a shakyhead. At 5 we added a swimjig in the mix. His PB came last year on it (6#2oz). He now has a spinnerbait rod, shakyhead rod, and jig rod. He threw his first hollow body frog last week on Fork. He is still working on setting the hook, that's a huge challenge for him over the excitement of getting bit. LOL!
Good luck with it, have patience, and make it about them when they are in the boat.

Reading that give me a little hope! Yesterday I went to scout a new lake. The kids wanted to go. I had my wife drive separately out to the lake so when they got bored after 45 minutes I wouldn't have to pack everything up. It was a tough trip because trying to find fish on a new lake with little ones in the boat didn't go well. It turned into a boat ride pretty quickly. I think for the next trip I'm going to make sure I know exactly where the fish are and try the same strategy with the with the wife driving separately. I think short trips to spots that are essentially honey holes is going to be the ticket until they get older.

Until a kid reaches 10 years old, its kind of hard to keep them from getting board while bass fishing. I started my two sons out perch fishing, crappie fishing and cat fishing, then once they got to where they had a little more discipline and patients I would take them bass fishing. We would go camping at a state park for a week, and I would take them in short stints. My oldest son is 29 now and loves it to this day, but he still doesn't even own his own rod and reel or even a lure, he just comes with me when he has the itch. My youngest son is now 24 and he just simply does not fish. In today's world of video games kids just get too bored fishing. There are some execeptions, some kids get hooked, but the most important thing is they have to be entertained, going out and catching 2 bass on a 8 hour trip is not fun for a kid, and for a kid it's like a long waste of a day, they start getting miserable thinking of what they could be doing if they were at home. You got to have a back up plan if the fishing turns cold. Let em swim for a while, or have a cell phone so they can play a video game if they get too bored. Minnows are fun to play with for a kid. Sand bass are a lot of fun and action for a kid as well once you get on a school of them.

Sounds like the guys above covered it pretty well, but I will reiterate what has worked with my 5 year old son.

We started when he was 3 at a local pond that I know well and put a weedless senko on his rod. It's amazing to me how well he picked up the waiting game. My goal each time we go out is for him to catch more than I do by focusing the trip around him. As soon as he starts getting bored, we either leave or change tactics. Some times just moving spots works, sometimes he is ready to go after 30 min. So we leave. I tried making him stay a few times, but quickly realized I was taking the fun out of it for him.

One trick that really works well for us is to make a snack bag, I think he gets more excited about getting his snacks together than he does fishing and a lot of times he spends more time deciding what snack to eat next than he does fishing. But that's ok. He enjoys it at his own pace for now, it can be frustrating since we love to fish, but to get them interested you have to make small steps and let the passion grow in them on its own.

Wish I had a 4yo and a 1yo again. They get older really quick so no time with them is wasted. I think hanging a minnow over the side and crappie fishing is another way for them to enjoy fishing and not near as hard. My youngest daughter still loves to fish and even has her own boat. Have fun with them at any age.

When you take younger kids out fishing just remember it's about them not you. Put yolp theur rods down and let them fish.

With 2 kids and 6 grandkids here's been my approach.

Start them out bream/bluegill fishing. Keep it simple.

We used mealworms for bait (clean and dry and available at large pet stores as reptile food), a cane or cheap lightweight fiberglass pole not too long and some light line 8-10# with cork/bobber and small bait hook. No fishing reel - just the pole and line. Otherwise when they're little they just want to crank the reel handles and reel the bait in instead of having patience to keep the bait in the water and watching the cork for bites.

Don't force the little ones to fish longer than their short attention spans can deal with.

When they get older (6+ yrs old) and have experience with the cane pole/no reel you can move them up to a closed-face and then an open-face spinning reel and then begin casting small lures.

I took my sons WB fishing when they were like 5 & 7 some of the best pics of them I have. They are 16 and 13 now, 13 yr old takes off on bike and goes all over the neighborhood. Daughter is 5 and gets up at 6am to go out in jonboat with me. Take snacks and drinks, every time, and try not taking any of your rods, help them with theirs, makes them feel special. Kids also like to play with bait like worms and minnows, we keep a tank sometimes and she goes and scoops them out and plays with them.

Fishing is just another attempt to keep them well rounded. My kids see me prep everything, watch me let fish go, help other anglers when we run into them, and have a good time. They also see me keep and clean them so they know where the food comes from sometimes.

Dad transitioned us from cat fishing to bass fishing by drift fishing with soft plastics -- no repeated casting or treble hooks to deal with. Find a good point, hump, etc. and let the wind do the work for you.

My son is 7 and loves to fish when they are biting . We keep his tablet charged and when he wants to fish ( 25% of the time )I put down my pole and and he is in charge of the boat. I still get to fish 75% of the day and he is happy watching the outdoors/ playing his tablet. It is a pretty easy give and take . We can spend a easy 6 hour day on the water . Just don't forget the snacks and the charging cord and all is well.

Do NOT get serious about it with kids or other people that don't get serious about it. When I bring the kids or wife bass fishing it's all about one thing, letting them catch a few. I still fish but I'm not out there to look all around for tournament fish. I try to always do something that's easy for everybody and still catches some fish. What they really enjoy is white perch fishing.

Starting off by saying these are not my kids… My wife is a nanny and has been with them for 3 years now so they stay over at least once a month or so. Joe has always asked me about fishing so we started them off at the local pond with worms and minnows catching perch and bass… They loved it but was done within an hour or so…. They asked one day if they could go on the boat and this was our first trip with many more to come.. It lasted 2 hours and as long as were catching something within 10 min of the last fish all was ok… One thing I learned was patience is a virtue. I think I enjoyed it more than the kiddos. Kiddos are 3.5 and 6 years old.

I have taken my son since he was about 3. I always made sure that when he was ready to go we would leave! Always have lots of snacks on the boat. We would bass fish and if not alot of action go catch some sand bass. He is 14 now and has become a great fisherman. He has a wicked hook set! Looking forward to next year as he becomes a freshman and will be fishing the high school deal.....

I've taken my son out since he was @ 5. One thing that I did that hasn't been mentioned is, I gave him a tackle box that he could fill with toys. He loved that he had two tackle boxes - one for lures and the other for toys. He would get bored fairly quickly and would swim. I had a throw line that I had him hold on and it worked for us. He (10y/o) still does this today, but without having to hold the throw line. He still likes being towed - holding the throw line while I'm on the trolling motor. We went out two weeks ago and he caught the first three keeper crappie.

As a 29 yo woman who started fishing with her dad at 2 and has not stopped yet, I remember that bass were what dad targeted. My rods were set up to catch anything that would bite a lure. I cannot recall how many times he pulled us away from the bass fishing to go chase a school of sandies. Back when the power plant was running on Monticello, we would get up early and drop jigs along the railroad bridge for big crappie. I even remember us targeting perch a few times. I did catch a few bass early on but make sure that you don't lock in on the bass. Bass can be a difficult target for young kids and the most important thing for them is to stay interested in fishing. Bass fishing will come with time. Until then, keep a look out for every opportunity to get their rods bent.

This little guy is two, almost 3. He has been in the boat with us since he was a baby. He is obsessed with fishing. We followed many of the steps others have mentioned to help him. Now he does it on his own.

A few weeks ago, he stood on the deck with us casting (no hook) and now he just fishes hooks and all. We bought him a new rod Saturday to upgrade his equipment since he caught this one and he's ready to go.

Watch this:

Emmett's First Catch by himself.

Very cool!

great question , my kids are both in their late twenties --boy is the oldest and my daughter the younger . My suggestion is to take them when the "action " is 100% going to happen . Doesn't matter if it's bass or bluegill or whatever . If they end up sitting around without action , they will get bored and end up not liking the "event " . My daughter loved using pieces of nightcrawlers to catch crawdads , she still remembers how much fun that was . She turned into a good bass fisherman and ended up going on a 4 day fishing trip to Alaska with me and hauling in a 90lb Halibut.
Make it fun , make it all for them , keep em busy and interested --they will grow up loving catching fish

short trips
bring food
sun screen cover them up