I can remember, I was only about 5 or 6, my father was working and my mother took me and my two older brothers to a lake near our house. We caught a ton of sunnies (as my mom called them) but they were bluegills. My father introduced me to the salt when I was only 10 and alast I’ve been corrupted ever since…ARRGH
“If it was easy anybody could do it”
Timothy S. Furey Sr.
I do not recall a time in my life i did not fish. Must have started before the age of reason.
Tom
I think the guys next door took me at 3 or 4. Ther is a story floating around about a sunfish in the sink. I got my first rod and reel at about 8 or 9. I don’t remember the rod but the reel was a Shakesphere closed face. By the time we were 10, Grampa was taking us to the salt, bottom fishing. Hadock was king, cod would do in a pinch.
Pete
We lived in a cabin by a lake till I was about 6 when we moved into town . My mom says when I was about 3 1/2 I used to catch fish in a big 2 gallon glass candy jar . I remember I’d sit in the lake up to my chest . I would bait the jar with a cloud of bread and put the lid on once the fish were in the jar . First one on a line when I was 8 standing in Ellis creek up to my knees with 4lb test leader not even on a stick just a hook and worm 2 inch red bellied dace . Took me a couple days to figure out I could tie the line onto a green alder fishing rod .
[This message has been edited by Gnu Bee Flyer (edited 08 November 2005).]
Mom both fished and hunted while pregnant with me. When I was five dad took me fishing on the the river where I caught a rock bass. When mom asked me what kind of fish I had caught I told her it was a bass stone lol. 
Eric “nighthawk”
It’s a great day for fly fishing!
Around 4
RW here,
Been fishing since I was about 3 or 4 when my uncle used to take me to the local bluegill pond. Eventually became a totally dedicated bass fisher. Didn’t get my first fly rod until I was about 20. Started tying fies (deer hair bugs) for bass when I was the same age. Didn’t start trout fishing until I was about 30, but have more than made up for that in the last 40 years. Fished both salt and freshwater for a lot of years. Did a lot of hunting in the early years too. Been a paid outdoor writer for half my life. Don’t know if what I’ve had to say helped anyone (sure hope so), but it darn well paid for a lot of fishing vacations. Be kind of hard to choose between brook trout and smallmouth bass as my favorite fish. I’ve spent most of my life fishing for both.
So how long has that been? About 65 years.
Later, RW
“We fish for pleasure; I for mine, you for yours.” -James Leisenring on fishing the wet fly-
Mom started me right after WWII, so I was about three to five years old. Cane pole. Many a nights went to sleep dreaming of a bobber on the waves. My uncle, her brother, stepped in when I “graduated” to what she called “fancy stuff.” My first fly rodding was thanks to a gift for doing the chores of a terminally ill neighbor, and I was about 10 or 11. Some sort of a metel telescopic thing that weighed a ton. Old outdoor Lifes, Sports Afield and Herters Catalogs were my main teachers on casting. Two fellows from church, a dairy farmer and an insurance salesman, got me started in flytying a couple of years later. I’d guess it takes a village to raise a fisher. JGW
My dad took me fishing before my memory started working so before the age of 3-4. We fished for warm water stuff like Carp and Catfish. He (my dad) had a bunch of cane poles he use to tie across the top to the front and back bumper of a 40 Chevy. He whittled his own wooden bobbers, they were long things with screw eyes on either end. Made his own dough bait…Wheaties, beer and strawberry soda pop. The line (which musta been 50-75# test braided stuff) would be wrapped around the last 3-4 feet of the tip of the pole. He caught some huge fish on that kinda gear…some fish he caught were bigger than I was. Later we all got Zebco stuff and I still have his Ambassadeur bait caster.
I dont believe he would have ever fly fished…its probably to complicated for him to mess with.
I fished for trout in Co before I was old enough to drive…with my dad.
I bought my first fly rod in 1964.
I don’t remember my first time fishing, Dad took me with him from the time I was 6 months old. (I have a vage memory of the first time I touched a fish which may or not be genuine) But the first fishing trip I remember happened when I was 3, and that trip is burnt into my memory.
My family went out to the Arkansas River near Cotopaxi in Colorado, for an overnight trip. We rented a cabin down by the river. Dad and I went down to the river to fish, while my sister and my mom stayed in the room and did what ever 2 year old girls and their moms do when dad and brother go fishing. On our return from the river we met up with my sister on the trail. She had wondered off, and of course by the time we got back to the room, my mother was convinced that she had been either, eaten by a bear, or had drowned in the river. The reunion scene is one that I will never forget.
I also remember that I caught fish that day, probably a 12 inch brown (gosh he looked big!), and a couple of rainbows, I remember clearly the tugging on the line, and how hard it was to reel that old Johnson closed face reel.
We ate the fish that night, coated in crushed cornflakes, salt and pepper, with fried potatoes and onions, and lots of iced tea.
Now, I don’t know how much of that I would remember had Sissy not scared my dear mother half to death. But every sense, from the sound of the river, to the smell of the wild rasberrys, to the taist of those trout is as clear today as it was then. I was and am hooked.
Ed
I think that I was 4. I caught a tiny catfish in Lake Lanier. It was so small that when it got off of the hook, it slipped between the boards of the dock. I have been catching fish of about that size ever since.
Ed
About 3 or 4. I don’t remember the fish or the fishing. What I do remember is this really cool electric rod that Dad would stick into the ground and the worms would come out. My sister and I were tasked with picking up the worms and putting them in a soup can 
The other thing I remember was that the girls got cane rods with no reel and the boys got rods with spinning reels. I was ****** !
Hi Harold,
This isn’t my first memory from
fishing but it’s definitly one of the
early ones.G I’m told I was holding a
pole while still in diapers.G Warm regards, Jim
Hey Harold. Not real sure? But I do know I was young. My Mom use to love to catfish and so that is were I started. When we moved we met a lady named Smitty and she use to take me Croppie fishing all the time. That and getting Crawdads to eat. Funny how it was ladies that got me hooked. LOL My dad while he did fish he liked to hunt more. Ron
Well now I remember bits and pieces.
Dad in the back of the canoe. Ray Chapman in the front. Me in the middle. It was the summer of '48 we were working the lily pads with a frog fly and Ray had a mouse. He was doing better that Dad and I. Could have been the front of the canoe or my squrming to see. They would plop the flies in a clear spot wait for every. Then a little longer. Just how long it took when you are 3 1/2 years old is 50 times longer than today. Bass would crash thoes big deer hair bugs. I remember Dad calling them Joe’s frogs and mice. This was on Wolverine Lake out north west of Detroit about 30 miles. Just after Dad was released from the Army Air Corp.
Been beating the waters of this great country every since.
ol Al
Ol’ Flysoup
Flycasting is as easy as flysoup
The first trip I remember clearly was going striped bass fishing with Dad on the Westport river at age four. We were trolling tube and worm type rigs way up in the shallow portion of the river and Dad chided me for letting out too much line. I caught two 5lb stripers on a couple of passes, while he pulled up oyster shells… We laughed then and never forgot that trip. I also recall him making up names for parts of the river that weren’t named, just to make it interesting for a little kid who got restless trolling and wanted to cast. He was a WWII vet, so he spiced the names with titles like “Tokyo Run”, etc. He started a passion in me that never burned out yet- the wonder of what will be on the other end of the line on the next cast, or around the next bend in the river… I hope that kids today can appreciate the wonders of the outdoors like we did, despite the distractions and “intensive” entertainment they have marketed to them now. (P.S. The stripers were keepers then, times do change!)
“Knowledge is knowing, wisdom is understanding”