Summer days lend themselves to family outings, and few activities can provide more fun than taking your children to a nearby lake or stream for a couple hours of fishing. With summer just hitting full stride, we’ve put together a list of suggestions for making the most of every family fishing trip.
-Focus on the Children: If your young anglers are quite young or inexperienced, leave your own rod and reel at home. Beyond the ongoing need to do stuff like undoing line twists and hopefully unhooking fish, you don’t want to miss the moment when a fish hits your daughter’s lure and she manages a nice hookset or when your son makes a perfect cast beneath an overhanging tree.
-Think Multi-Species: More species translates to more opportunities for action, and most children don’t care what kind of fish or size of fish they catch. Use small lures and be equally ready to cast to bluegills as bass when you see some ‘gills hanging near a downed tree.
Use Child Friendly Lures:
YUM Dingers - If any fish are shallow, it’s hard to go wrong with a 3- or 4-inch YUM Dinger on a weightless Texas rig. Just cast near cover and let the lure do the rest.
Heddon Tiny Torpedos – Among the easiest to work of all topwater lures, Tiny Torpedos will bring bass and even panfish crashing to the top, creating big excitement.
Rebel Teeny Wee-Crawfish – Cast ‘em out and crank ‘em in and expect to catch everything that swims. Rebel Crawfish are most often associated with streams (where they indeed work marvelously) but they also do the job well in ponds and lakes.
YUM Wooly Beavertails – Whether fished on leadheads or small spinner rigs, 1- or 2-inch Wooly Beavertails make outstanding multi-species lures for young anglers.
Bring Bobbers: Adding a bobber to the line above a Wooly Beavertail or a YUM Dinger keeps the bait in the strike zone, makes light offerings easier to cast and helps youngsters (and their parents) know when they are getting strikes.
-Keep it Simple: Fish as close to home as possible, and avoid long, fast boat rides. While boats offer their own element of fun, the shoreline approach makes it easier to fish side-by-side and devote all your attention to the fishing itself. Using push-button reels and carrying only a small tackle box also help simplify things.
-Bring Snacks: Along with keeping everyone fueled and happy, snacks and drinks help break any lulls created by uncooperative fish.
-Enjoy Your Surroundings: As much as you might want to focus on helping your children catch fish, they may get caught up chasing grasshoppers or watching ducks and they may even want to abandon the lake to hit the playground behind them after a while. Remember whose fishing trip it is, and when they want to go swing and slide, go swing and slide.
Don’t Forget the Camera: Pictures preserve the memories of a fun day and allow the children to share with grandparents and friends.