Pier/harbour fishing with Children - Advice please

I am planning a weekend fishing trip with my son (age 7), in the kerry area (we will be camping) in the next few weeks, and I am looking for advice on safe marks, preferably Pier or harbours where I feel a bit secure about having a child with me.

Any advice on such marks (and ones that will fish fairly reliably, I'd love him to be able to catch something!)

Thanks,

JP

Hi JP,

What part of Kerry are you going to be in?

Donal?

Doesn't really matter where - have tent will travel!

JP,

Here's a response to a previous post about baits in the Beara peninsula. I fished this mark with my son a couple of weeks back and had great sport with Mackeral. I was specifically fishing for mackeral once I realised they were there but i have caught thornies, dogs and huss to 9lbs here before.

Cheers
Donal.

Not sure if I'm too late with this mail but as Kieran says the tackle shop in Waterville stocks frozen baits and having just returned I would recommend their frozen sandeel as the highest quality "frozen" sandeel I have ever used.

Another option is to go on to the Bridge between Valentia and Portmagee and you will catch mackeral on a rising tide. Go into the middle of the bridge on the Valentia side of the tower beneath the bridge and use a float fished sandeel or half a sandeel at a dept of about 10 feet and you will get plently of mackeral. You can park the car either end of the bridge and walk on the pavement to this spot in under a minute. Park in the wider area of the bridge opposite the Skelligs experience building.

If you don't have any bait use any small silvery coloured lure or as I discovered you can use a nite lite on the hook to catch the mackeral at night.

As a note on the bridge itself I have previously caught good Bull Huss, Doggies and Thornbacks from it at night using mackeral on a single hook ledger. If you hook a biggie you can pull them to the side of the bridge where you can work your way down a slope and beach the fish instead of trying to haul it up onto the bridge.

It's a nice easily accessed fishing spot with no casting skills required as you can drop your bait right into the middle of the channel by just releasing the bail arm.

There are a lot excellent spots to fish in the area and I know most of them are listed on the fishing marks on this website so take a look at them before you go.

Try St. Finians bay very early in the morning for bass. I am saying early in the morning because the days I went to fish it it was swarmed by surfers.