For many parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles who love to spend time on the water, fishing with kids is a dream ac-tivity. This is because there is a special kind of joy inherent in sharing one of your passions with a child, and in turn, them becoming one of your new fishing buddies. In order to get kids interested, and then keep their attention while waiting for the fish to bite, it’s important to know how to make fishing fun with kids. From finding the right places to fish with kids to having the right equipment, here are 6 tips for how to fish with kids.
1. Location, Location, Location
Just as when you decided where to live and buy a home, location is everything! When finding the best places to fish with kids, there are a couple of things to consider to make fishing with kids as enjoyable as possible. First, and most im-portantly, try to choose a body of water that’s well stocked with a high volume of fish. This will help increase the odds that you and your children will not have to wait too long for the gratification of catching one, or at least the thrill of get-ting a fish on the line and trying to reel it in. This is answer number one to the question of how to make fishing fun with kids! Second, you will want to pick a location that doesn’t carry with it the prerequisite of long drive or even worse, a long walk to reach the water. If your kiddo gets tired and antsy before the fishing even begins, your chances of having a pleasant day fishing with kids will be diminished.
2. The Shallower The Better
Similar to where you fish with kids, the type of water is also important. The second part of the places to fish with kids decision is choosing to be on or near shallow water when you fish with kids. The shallower the water, the better your kid’s chance to see fish zooming around, and better the chances they will get excited about the prospect of spending a few hours on the water. Deep, glassy water with nothing fun to see will likely not provide enough entertainment for little kids fishing with dad.
3. Readily Available Diversions
Of course you would be happy to sit quietly by or on the water for hours, but kids fishing with dad may require some clever diversions to break up the waiting involved before the fish start to bite in earnest. To make fishing with kids as fun as possible, bring a few toys, coloring books, digging tools, and a children’s fishing book (one that has good, bright and colorful pictures of the different types of fish) along with your rods, reels, lures, and bait. These readily available diversions will help to keep your kiddo entertained and make the outing enjoyable, and thus, repeatable in the future!
4. The Best Fishing With Kids Equipment
A fishing rod and reel set with their favorite superhero character or a kids fishing set of their own complete with carrying bag, plus a suite of colorful lures, floats, bobbers, and other fishing with kids equipment will get your kid excited for trout fishing along a local river or heading out onto a pontoon boat. Having their own gear will make them feel grown up and more like a real angler!
5. Pack Food for Fishing with Kids
You may decide to use live bait to get fish on the line when fishing with kids. You’ll also want to use food to lure your kids into going trout fishing along a river or heading out on a boat with you! So pack your kids favorite foods, a picnic-worth of sandwiches, snacks, juice boxes, water, and more to ensure that they are happily munching away and in time, will become your newest and cutest fishing buddy!
6. Enroll in Angler Academy
One easy way that you can learn how to make fishing fun with kids is to start fostering their joy of fishing at home. Be-fore packing up the car or carrying fishing poles and a tackle box to your local lake, check out the many free resources, games, and activities that will bring the joy of fishing indoors. Your kids can make fishy crafts, download coloring pag-es, try ice fishing experiments at home, and so much more.
Being safe is critical to enjoying a great day on the water with kids. Here are some important safety tips to consider be-fore going fishing with kids.
