My son Alex is turning 3 this month. I bought him a little spinning rod and reel last fall and he's been practicing reeling in pretend fish from the top of our stairwell ever since.

Last night I decided it was time to try to get him into some real fish. Not being a lake fisherman myself, always have fished rivers, I did a little research on the web and decided to give Lake Ballinger a try last night after work.

Dropped my DB in and started trolling small flatfish around with my electric. In between answering my sons 1000's of questions I noticed a fish jumping out where I thought our line might be. Fish on!

Grabbed the rod and handed it off. I had to help him with it some at first as he didn't quite get the concept that the thing tugging on the end of the line was a fish and he should reel it in. He kept asking "Where's the fish?", "I don't see a fish", ...

By the second fish he was all dialed in and landed it completely by himself .

We ended up losing one more and missing a bite in about 1.5hrs of fishing. Alex would have sayed out a lot longer, but I'd promised his mom to have him home by bed time.

The best fishing partners are the ones you grow yourself

Here are a few pics:

Very cool...

Hey I bet that fish grew a inch or ten in his mind by the time you got home

Mom it was this .................................................................................................................................................................................... ...................................................big

That's great, Boss. Looks like you got a fishin' buddy for life now! Enjoy this time now, cuz they grow up too darn fast!

Nice job!

A few tips for future trips. Keep the trips short. Get good gear for the kids, like the nice life jacket you have on him, and good rain gear. When he is done, you are done. Bring lots to eat, and drink, and play games.

It looks like you are starting out just right.

I can hardly wait until they are old enough to row a driftboat!

Dogfish, that is so true, Mine is 8 and now I will even take my laptop so he can go down into the cabin and play games and warm up,

Seems like he never stays down there too long tho', Although I think I may have to get a bigger fridge to hold enough food for him for 4 hours

Great pics Bossman (and good tips from the other folks).