Taking Kids Fishing – The Right Way and The Wrong Way
Stories from the Past
by Todd Staley
David Stanley runs a family-owned wholesale fishing tackle company in Clearwater, Florida that has been in business for longer than I have known him, which is pushing on half a century. He has been coming to Crocodile Bay Costa Rica since we opened and even bought a vacation home here. He is actually the reason I ended up in Costa Rica 30 years ago. He brought me down here for my first trip in the mid-eighties and introduced me to the man who would become my first boss in Costa Rica and mentor, the late Archie Fields.
He explained to me that in all his years in the tackle business, he has never been busier. He said it was because of Covid-19. He explained that with the limited options for entertainment, and people locked in their houses, one of the few activities that did not get shut down was fishing. He said kids and parents alike got tired of being indoors, got tired of their video games, and fishing was an outdoor option the family could do as a unit. He has been selling starter fishing kits and fishing tackle like it was the last Coca Cola in the desert.
According to the American Sportfishing Association even before the current crisis, new anglers were on the rise, and that 50% of all new anglers are introduced to the sport by their mothers. I started my own kids off fishing early. Once they mastered the basics we went after bigger game. One of my most memorable ‘Father/Son’ trips was before I moved to Costa Rica when my oldest was 12 years old. He wanted to take me tarpon fishing on Father´s Day. I watched him hook and battle 5 tarpons while Dad never even got a bite. I don´t know who was glowing more, me watching all this happen or him, kicking Dad´s butt. Jason is still a pretty good snook fisherman in Florida. My Costa Rican son Sharlye worked as Captain German´s mate here at Crocodile for several years and is now an often-requested captain on one of our Boston Whalers. My daughter Alisson is the first woman in the family to get a Captain´s license.
After David´s phone call I started thinking about my experience with kids coming to Crocodile Bay. I was often asked by clients if it was OK to take their young kids on the boat with them. I never said no, but I have one rule. Make it your child´s day, not yours. If you take them out on the ocean and cook them in the sun all day to watch Dad catch a big fish, you really haven´t accomplished anything. Kids need action with smaller fish that they can catch themselves. If you start them that way, they just might catch the fishing bug. Some of my best conversations with clients were before dinner with youngsters telling me all about the fish they caught.
Some of the most memorable experiences with kids did not always go as planned. A Dad asked about taking his wife and their 5-year old out fishing with him. I gave him my ‘make it your son´s day’ speech. And he explained he doesn´t big game fish often, so could he hire another boat for his wife and son. She was a little nervous so I explained that they only needed to go about 10 minutes from the resort and there was a reef where the water was flat and it was full of baby snapper and triggerfish. There, he could pull on them till he was worn out and also learn about catch and release.
So off they went the next morning after I instructed their captain exactly what I wanted him to do. The little one was all excited, and mom was cautious but looking forward to a good time. I felt confident I was playing a small part in creating part of the next generation of anglers, until…..a couple of hours later I was down at the pier and I saw their boat coming around the corner headed back to the pier and I thought the little guy must be worn out catching tons of little fish. As they got closer, I realized just how wrong I was. The poor kid was a whiter shade of pale and mom was a ghastly grey. They looked like they had either been through a hurricane, or both had stuck a butter knife in an electric socket.
“It was horrible,” she gasped, “my son was scared to death and we spent the whole-time vomiting.” Then they headed for the hotel.
I asked their captain just what the hell happened. He explained on his way out he heard on the radio there was a school of tuna 14 miles offshore. The ocean was a little rough that day but he decided to run out there.
After he heard a barrage of words from me I wouldn´t say within 100 yards of a church he calmly said, “Boss I don’t understand why you are so angry, I caught 4 tuna.”
“That little guy reeled them in?” I asked,
“No, they were too big for him.”
“Mom?”
“She was too sick.”
“Who caught the fish?”
“The mate and me.”
Later at the hotel, I apologized profusely to mom and told her I would not be charging them for the fiasco today. I told her I would like to send them out tomorrow free of charge so the little guy could have a good experience.
It took a millisecond for her to respond, “Not in a million years.”
The PhD and his 9-year-old son will always be one of my favorite memories of kids and fishing. He was a divorced part-time dad taking his boy on vacation with him. As they were checking in to the hotel the boy was looking wide-eyed at the fishing pictures that hung in the lobby. I approached Dad and said, “Welcome Mr So & So.” He gave me a stern look and told me he preferred to be referred to as Dr So & So.
On their first day out on the water, the little guy got sea-sick and laid in the boat while dad caught a couple of sails and a big dorado. I suggested the next day maybe they should go inshore where the fishing is more hands-on and you can almost always find calm water so they could have some action and get his sea legs. We all agreed it was a good idea.
I was surprised to see them walk back into the hotel about ten the next morning. I noticed the boy holding his hand that had a small hook embedded in it. I took them to our lounge area and fetched the first aid kit, returned and passed it to his father and said, “Here you go.”
He looked at me, then at his son´s hand and blurted out, “I can´t do that!”
Surprised I said, “I thought you were a doctor.”
“I am he said, I´m a Psychologist.”
After spending my first 5 years in Costa Rica running a lodge on the Caribbean side of the country that was 4 hours from medical attention, I had gotten quite proficient at hook removal. I went and got a piece of 100 lb leader. If you loop it around the hook and press the eye of the hook against the skin and give it a quick jerk, the hook will exit the same hole it made in the skin going in with very little pain.
I had the boy place his hand on the table palm up and prepared the 100-pound test around the line around the embedded hook. I could see he was scared to death. By this time, I couldn´t resist and I said to his dad, “OK Doc, convince him this isn’t going to hurt.” I asked the boy if he wanted to catch a fish as big as the one in the picture over there and pointed to a bank of photos on the wall. He turned to look and I gave a quick yank and the hook easily came out.
After dressing the small wound, I told them they still had plenty of time to fish. The youngster said he didn´t feel like fishing so I told dad if he wanted to go, we would be more than happy to keep an eye on the boy. So off he went. If the world gives you lemons, then I am the make lemonade kind-of-guy. So at lunch, I sat down with the boy and we talked about soccer, baseball, video games and fishing. I asked him if he wanted to catch a fish and I explained I would take him down to the pier and he surely would catch something. But I also explained that the fish at the pier were my personal pets so he had to put them all back in the water. But I did tell him he could keep one snapper to surprise his dad with for dinner.
So off to the pier we went where 4 or 5 of my crew, that weren´t fishing that day, were working on their boats. I turned my crew loose on the boy. Of course, they would rather help the kid than scrub their boats so they began baiting his hook, coaching, encouraging and just having a great time. The boy caught lots of fish in a couple of hours. Later our chef prepared his specialty, a nice whole fried snapper which the boy surprised his dad with at dinner.
The next day when they returned to the dock from fishing, the father-son pair had big smiles on their faces and were much more relaxed. I thought to myself, I just might have made a little fisherman.
More Articles by Todd Staley
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