What age for kids in the boat?

I'm not talking about YOUR kids or grandkids. What age would you expect a friend or acquaintance's kids to be before you would feel comfortable having them in your boat all day?

I'm asking because I'm starting to have folks ask to bring along their 4-5 year olds. Right now I'm telling them it's not a good idea. I'm sure there are many well behaved 4-5 year olds who have the attention span of an adult and will happily spend all day in whatever weather conditions. I'm also sure many 4-5 year olds have a 20 second attention span and would rather be rummaging thru my crankbait boxes while their clueless parents are oblivious to anything. I've had some 6-8 year olds along who were holy terrors all day and it made for a miserable trip for everybody.

I have no way of knowing which group a child is going to be in so I'm thinking seriously of putting an age limit on kids who can come on my charters. I'd like your thoughts on this. What age do you think would be appropriate to start kids out on a guide charter in a fishing boat, not a family deck boat or pontoon?

Doug, good call. I'm not sure I've seen any 4-5 year-olds that have attention span of an adult! A lot depends on the attentive attitude on the parents. Sorry if I've offended anyone.

I'm gonna say .... 13yrs old (if they get bored fishing they can always stare at their phone :fingerdance )

Lots of ways for a little one to be hurt on a boat. I don't believe so much it would be a difference in the children. Rather than a difference in the parents. Usually well behaved children have parents that pay attention to what their children are doing.

Personally I see no need for an age limit. We started em water skiing in my family around 2 years old.... but a chartered trip changes things.
If I were a guide and didn't like kids (which I dont) I'd say 12-13. But if you dont mind kids and the expectation is that few fish will be caught if they bring small kids...
This could be the first and only time a person is exposed to fishing and or boating.

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Originally Posted by Baitwaster

Personally I see no need for an age limit. We started em water skiing in my family around 2 years old.... but a chartered trip changes things.
If I were a guide and didn't like kids (which I dont) I'd say 12-13. But if you dont mind kids and the expectation is that few fish will be caught if they bring small kids...
This could be the first and only time a person is exposed to fishing and or boating.

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I love kids and have coached 4-H Shooting Sports and helped many times with fishing rodeos and such. Those all had age limits of around 9 years old. I had an 11 year old Saturday who caught the 2 best fish of the day as a double and 10 minutes later was laying on the livewell, bored. His parents were great but an hour later I had him and his Mom back at the marina. The rest of us continued the trip.

I know kids all have different personalities but I'm seriously thinking 8 years old for the lower age limit. My family and friends who I know will be responsible can be different. I try to keep the trips geared to the age group but have had 8 year olds hang in there pulling cranks all day and still be excited at the end of the day.

A few 10 year olds would have the ability and want to learn. Dang few. Early teens for the ones that enjoy and want to know more about the outdoors. There
is no age limit on people who don't respect the outdoors. The ones who throw their drink cans and snack wrappers over board, constantly complaining about
heat or cold, constantly on their phone, and the list goes on. Those folks want to make the trip and get it over with so they can get back to the country club and
tell the story about their fishing trip. An all day trip (6 to 8 hrs) I'm gonna say teen age. As far as which ones are idiots, I don't know how you weed them out
without taking them on a trip.

I agree with CrappiePappy, I was going to say 13 also. A family taking a younger person out on a personal craft, as long as it is done safely, is their business. But keeping your charter from potentially becoming a floating daycare would seem prudent. There might possibly be some bank fishing opportunities for families with young ones, but with little fishing knowledge or equipment if you chose to offer them. When boat fishing all day it’s not fair to expect kids behave. That’s why I like their early experiences to be on shore. That way if they get bored and need to run off some energy it’s easy to do. Quite often when they see someone catch fish they’re right back into for awhile.

You may want to consider reserving some days for 1/2 day or evening trips. A lot of catfish and inshore charter guides do that, specifically to allow for more family friendly trips for groups with little ones or people that simply aren’t interested in fishing all day. I would think that part of being a fishing guide (aside from earning a living) would be to share the joy of fishing with others. As an adult, I don’t have a problem fishing for a 6-8 hour stretch if the bite were good, but kids just don’t have the capacity to do anything for that long. But don’t count them completely out, as they are the next generation of sportsmen... and paying customers!


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Charge price for everybody , let them decide . pay up front . Take off water when they can't control the kids . Taught school 32 years and can say with certainty there is no age appropriate way to tell . Some 10 year olds may be way ahead of mom's new boyfriend . As many times I wanted to say something to adults than kids . :twocents

If they bring young kids, adult guest does NOT fish, only supervises kids. Guides are not baby sitters. I have 7 and 9 year olds. When on a guided trip I am just an assistant guide and only people fishing are the kids...period.

Took my 2 yr old and 5 yr old out today for first time. Wasn’t long and they crying and ready to leave. 1- 1.5 hr is all and it started getting rough.

Post an age limit of your choice on your web page and be done with it.

attention spans for children are pretty short , like 3 minutes maybe per year old .
under 10 is likely going to be a lot of work on the water .
my 8 year old can do about 20 before drifting for 20 ….

13................

I would say 13 as well.

When you say "guide charter", do you mean a guided trip where you are taking 1-3 other people who are all in the same family/group and booked together? If we're talking about a shared charter where strangers will be on the same boat as other strangers (like deep sea trips), the answer is way different.

Assuming it's the "family" type trip, then there are pros and cons to taking any age, so I'll stick to the "no age limit" side since others have weighed in on why not to take them.

First and foremost, make sure to have a liability waiver that both your attorney (and you need to operate as a corporation for the protections) and your insurance company agree with. It'd be something essentially that you are not responsible for any personal injuries on your boat.

Here are the pros:

Kids have a short attention span. I've heard 2 mins for every year of age. So, a 4 year old can handle 8 minutes. You could very easily get a "look, the kid can't handle this, lets end the trip early." Full pay, short day :)

Seeing a kid's face light up with the monster (3 inch) fish they just caught.

Other thoughts:

The parent may just want some bonding time with the child. If you're trolling, perhaps you'll go to fewer rods so that when you get into the fish, you don't have 8+ rods going crazy at once. The kid just wants to catch fish (or the parent thinks that's what the kid wants).

Kids won't listen to their parents, but will listen to other adults. It's an odd thing, but it's true. So, if dad tells the kid that you need to be patient, the kid ignores it. But when a "professional fisherman" tells them to let it hold a little longer, they suddenly aren't deaf. :) To go along with the previous comment, perhaps the kid has shown an interest in fishing and wants someone to show them how.

Based on the conditions, explain to the parent up front (during booking) that you may have to utilize certain tactics to locate and catch the fish. For instance, if you're spider rigging, your attention is on the trolling motor. You can't just stop the boat for every fish. Explain that the parent will be handed the rod with the fish on it and the parent will need to help the child.

Explain what YOUR services are (and aren't). For instance "My service is to put you on fish; I cannot guarantee anything other than bites" (assuming you have a no fish=free trip policy). With small children, the catch rate will be considerably reduced as children simply need more time and opportunities to catch fish.

Also, offer the chance to go "perch jerking" if it's just about numbers of fish. Sometimes, it's just about "I want my kid to have fun and catch a lot of fish, but don't care what we catch".

Mention to the parents that you are (or aren't) a "G-rated" guide, meaning like movie ratings. In other words, you aren't going to use foul language. I had a guide in Texas tell me that people would call and ask if he was "g-rated" and said no, and the parents would say "I can't believe how hard it is to find one" and he finally asked what "g-rated" meant because he was clearly losing opportunities. He thought it was like a certification or "approval" from some "professional association". Nope, they just wanted a guide that was family-friendly.

If you do take kids, I'd suggest docking the boat and before everyone loads up, go over basic equipment you'll use, how that equipment works, what to expect, what not to expect, and demonstrate how to cast the equipment, how to retrieve, how to set the hook, and so on.

One other thing, ask the dad if the kid has a fishing pole. If he says "we'll get one", steer them away from those danged barbie or scooby rods. Steer them toward a $20 zebco 33 combo if at all possible. Keep a spool of say 8# line (no point in 2# line on a zebco 33) on board and offer to strip and re-spool the reel before starting (unless it comes with decent line).

Also, be sure to ask what the customer wants from the trip. It may be the dad wants to fish and mom said "take junior with you", in which case, tell dad to load up some games for the kid on the phone and tether it to something so the kid will stay in one part of the boat and not lose the phone :).

Also, suggest that both parents come along, even if one parent doesn't care about the fishing. This will allow dad to do his guide trip and mom can take care of entertaining little Billy. (gender bias notwithstanding) :)

In SC any child 12 or younger MUST wear a CG approved life vest suited to their size.
Don't know about other states but that's a common ticket item in SC according to DNR.

I'm going with 13 also

Thanks for the replies. I run a family friendly, no alcohol operation but I feel many parents today totally give raising their kids to anybody else. I dealt with a 6 year old the first year I was guiding who totally ruined the trip simply because the trip was for Grandpa, who was Stage 4 cancer, and the kid's Dad had never told the kid the word NO. I want to be fair to those kids who are gung-ho about fishing and want to learn but it's hard to make that decision until I get the kid in the boat. I've had many good family trips with kids under 10 but the kids were supervised by adults who wanted the trip to be all about the kids.

Vicki and I talked about this last night and I think I'm going with each child, 8 and over, must be accompanied by a supervising adult who will be totally responsible for that child. While it doesn't happen often, the requests have come in after this virus and I just need to take care of it the best way I know how.

I would say 9-10 would be the slot.


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IMHO: Anyone who exposes a young child to an protracted engagement of fishing like a charter fishing trip is asking to turn that child against fishing; because more likely than not, the child is going to be bored, hot, cold, windblown, sunburned or over/under corrected. Due to this reason and all of all of the good reasons already listed... I would agree that the minimum age for 1/2 day trip should be 10 years of age and an all day ship should be 12 years of age. I would also have a written policy that an unruly child constitutes grounds for the trip to end and the fees would not be refundable.

Ask the client if they are expecting an adult fishing trip or a kid fishing trip. Maybe bring along another set of gear for kids. I can understand a parent wanting to try to get his daughter on some good fish and if he's paying you do what you can to cater to kid fishing. Maybe bobbers, closed faced reels, and bait they feel comfortable with, that a kid can operate even snacks that kids like. And you stop when time runs out or kids and parents agree it is to hot or bored or whatever else.
Adult trips, well that's the same as what you've been doing all along. I just know that my kids love to fish but I do tend to over do it and stay out to long. I tend to not bring them snacks or drinks and my daughter has even gotten dizzy in the boat from being too hot.
Find out who the trip is for and everyone will be happier.

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I don’t know about age. But I’d be up front and tell them the child is your responsibility and if anything is broken there responsible. And if the trio has to be cut short because of child there’s no refund. I’ve taken a lot of kids fishing some very young loved it all day I’ve had 16 years old that where bored before the boat stopped at the first spot.


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10 1/2 day, 12 all day...sounds reasonable...

Lol that's a hard question. At 4 I would fish all day and night but most kids don't. My 9yr old girl doesn't care about fishing much but] my 3yr boy will hang in there all day but you have to watch him like a hawk, he gets into everything but as soon as the fish are biting he's right with you.

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This is a great question and one I've thought about a lot. This year is my 19th as a guide for mostly crappie. Some of my best days have been with kids on the boat but all the worst days have been with kids on the boat. So much depends on the parenting. As far as the kids they're all different but if I had to pick an age in general it would probably be 9. I like helping them fish and teaching them within reason but I won't babysit. It can be a constant battle trying to keep them in the life vest. If I have to constantly watch them to protect everything in the boat I need to operate everyday I don't want them onboard. And parents, leave the hard action figures at home. Banging them into everything on the boat within reach will cut the trip real short.

Attachment 375823
Today was a dream day because the Grandparents took control, watched the kids’s every move, and made sure they were comfortable. The weather cooperated with clouds, threat of showers, and mostly mild winds. The kids did their job by having a good time and making sure most of the hooked fish came over the side.


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Originally Posted by M R Dux

Attachment 375823
Today was a dream day because the Grandparents took control, watched the kids’s every move, and made sure they were comfortable. The weather cooperated with clouds, threat of showers, and mostly mild winds. The kids did their job by having a good time and making sure most of the hooked fish came over the side.


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Well I guess that answers your question. Cut off age is just below what them kids are. Lol. Glad y'all had a great day.

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