Eli, my 5 year old, and I made a quick trip to a community park south of Houston in search of the elusive channel catfish that had supposedly been stocked recently at the pond.  It was a standard Texas summer day, with highs in the low 90’s, and scattered showers.  We had never ventured to this park, so a new destination is always exciting.  We brought 2 rods with us, both light duty spinning outfits.

Eli’s standard setup is a Zebco Ladies Ultralight spinning combo, loaded 6 pound test mono.  I brought a Shimano spinning reel on a 6′ medium rod with fast action.  I prefer a shorter rod for myself and the kids when fishing in a pond setting for smaller fish.  This allows for more compact travel in the car and casting distance is not as important.

On the way to the park we stopped off at Walmart and pickup a package of 18 night crawlers.  My goal for the day was just her enjoyment and the continual process of learning the love of fishing.  We arrived at the park and found a peaceful setting with very few other anglers currently fishing. The pond has a fountain in the middle, with 2 metal t-head piers.  The park is a 107 acre complex and located at 1700 Glenn Lakes Ln., Missouri City, TX 77459.  We found one of the piers to be unoccupied and quickly setup our chairs to start fishing.

I setup Eli with the smallest eagle claw snell hook with a foam bobber.  The bobber was rigged roughly 18″ above the hook.  When targeting small panfish at a park pond, my experience has been to use the smallest hook possible to guarantee success.  The small hooks allow even the smallest bream or sunfish to actually get the hook into its mouth.  The young angler usually will not even need to properly set the hook, since when the start to reel, the hook will find a place to lodge.

I rigged my spinning outfit with a fish finder rig, since I was targeting the elusive channel catfish.  I used a 1 oz egg sinker above a swivel, with about 18″ of line from the swivel to the hook. We both used live night crawlers for bait, I cut Eli’s into roughly 1/2″ long pieces.

The action started immediately and was non-stop for our 90 minute adventure.  Eli was able to land 12 bluegill while I only managed 1 larger bluegill on the bottom.  The nice benefit of community pond fishing is the non-stop action for kids, that helps them maintain focus and not get bored.  She required that I take pictures of each trophy and change the wallpaper on my phone to a picture that included her holding one of the bluegill.

I was able to get a video of the a complete landing of one of the monsters.  Check it out below.  After about 90 minutes of sitting in the warm Texas sun, she asked if we could make a trip to the park play structure.  That was the signal needed to pack up our gear.  She played on the structure for a little while and then we headed for home.  Overall it was a very successful trip and she had a great time!