Congratulations! No kids here (yet), but I do know that you can find infant PFDs from several manufacturers. I'd start there and then figure out what sort of carrier is compatible with it. As for strapping it down, I don't see why you couldn't use a cooler/casting platform kit.

 

With our kids I was always concerned about having them strapped into something and especially attached to the boat... I would think a PFD and lay her in a carrier of some sort without buckling her in

 

solid advice. I have three kids and this is how I’ve done it. Don’t strap them in just get them in an appropriately sized life jacket. After that just make sure you have shade for him/her

 

PFD and mommy carries the infant full time. Make sure you have shade, an umbrella is fine. Don't take the kid an mommy out in the slop

 

This

Go early, lots of snacks, and short trips.

Go with the focus of just going for a short ride, don’t try to make a day of it or do too much. The child will certainly let you know when they are over it.

 

Yeti 45 ought to be plenty big enough.

 

If you have a decent blanket as well those infant life jackets practically have a built in pillow anyway. I used those little pinching clamps and a white bed sheet to make a tent, put here on the floor in her blankie and had mom pole me around. Always mom holding while running.

 

Mom in bean bag holding the kiddo. Tear drop beanbag works best and is great for napping also providdd you have shade

 

The above +extra baby wipes. And get the kid enrolled in an infant rescue swim class as soon as you can.

 

I have a 5 month old and we were just looking into ISR for the same reasons.

I'm shocked at the price though. Our neighborhood have a couple instructors that offer it at the neighborhood pool and it's 800-1100 dollars depending how long the infant needs to grasp it.

 

I have 2 kids, been taking them on the boat since they were basically newborns. My advice is experience and practical. Some people won't agree with it but I dont care. I've been on boats since I was a kid and driving boats alone since I was 12 and I'm 40.

1. I dont put a newborn baby in a life jacket. You aren't taking a newborn anywhere going fast anyways or rough. If you plan on doing that it, rethink it. They have no neck control and your wife is going to be sleep deprived and exhausted and sore anyways when they are this young. Here is some thing my wife bought that has a padded rim around it and on the back and a tent thing that goes over it. You can see him resting in it. Shade is a must and obviously bring all the shit they need (diapers, wipes, snacks, extra milk, etc etc etc in case you break down and have to be towed you dont want to be stuck with a hungry whiney kid). Get a chargeable small fan that has those grippy legs so you can put it near them to blow on them. You can see the green one in the pic below sticking out just up from my wifes hand on my son.

2. When they can sit up and have head control and then get mobile (crawling), I put a pack in play in the boat, tie it off so it doesnt slide, and just put them in that. Hold them while you are under way and then when you are stopped and at the sandbar or going idle or fishing, throw them in the pack n play with toys and stuff. If they want to wear a life jacket, great. If not, I dont force it on them. Again, I am not taking a kid that young into some questionable conditions. I keep the life jacket near in case I would need to grab it but Im not going out that long or that far with kids. Make sure they have shade from umbrella or a cover over the pack in play but the netting lets air in so it doesnt get so hot.

3. When they get a little older, I found they like water wings way better than a life jacket around the neck. I also hang a swing from the ttop and let them sit in that and swing. I dont have a boat with a ttop anymore so I just have the wife or I hold him while we are riding and then just let him walk around the boat with water wings on now that he is old enough.

 

Congrats! Like others have said start early and expect the trips to be short. Our first trip was all of about 15 minutes lol. Mom and baby in a bean bag worked best for us as well. We figured out after our first trip that golf cart rides really helps them get used to the wind in the face. I bought a seasucker rod holder and use that to move an umbrella around the boat as needed when we are stopped.

 

Hello everyone,

My wife and I are expecting our first child and are trying to figure out a safe way to take her on the boat/fishing with us. I was thinking that figuring out a way to secure a baby carrier would be great. Has anyone done something like this? Any pictures are advice of good ways to do this would be great. We have a 17' Maverick HPX-V

Buddy of mine put the kid in a big deep cooler lined with foam, strapped to the deck, with the lid bungeed up as a wind screen. A piece gauzy fabric strategically taped for sunscreen/tent. We’d hand him a hooked-up rod and he’d fight the fish standing up in the box. He’s college age now, and we still call him “Cooler Baby”. Oh, he’s a fishin’ machine.

 

What I thought I read :

Advice for making a baby on the boat


I was like ……..seriously?

 

Hahaha, we’re all set in that department!

 

First off, congrats. Do what you think is right for your family, it's your decision how to care for them.

That being said here is my advice after 5 years of taking my 2 infant/toddler boys on boats year round. Make sure you shop around for infant life jackets that they aren't going to hate and scream in all day. I made this mistake with my second child. He hated the one my first boy used so I physically took him to try on several different ones until we found one he seemed most comfortable in. Also make sure it actually self-rights when they're wearing it. The bath tub is a good place to test it. Never strap the infant or child to anything on the boat, including yourselves (baby carrier), mom or you should be holding at all times your running. Get them in ISR classes as soon as they're old enough if you plan on having them out often. I have two young boys and both of them did ISR for a month or two multiple times of the year and still do. The shit works and is literally life-saving for them. Wear your engine cut off lanyard any time that motor is running. Get used to having to get out super early and leave the water early if you use a busy boat ramp. There's nothing worse than sitting at a busy ramp with a screaming baby and a pissed off wife that's ready to go home and they have to wait in a hot truck as the boat ramp champs try to get their pontoons in and out of the water.

Again, this is just my advice based on my experience, what you do with it is up to you. Best of luck to you in your future adventures, take them in and take lots of pictures. Time flies and they grow up quick. Nothing beats the pride I have getting my family out on the water and away from technology and screens.

 

Start em out young, oh the memories. Here’s my son with his first tarpon

 

Good advice above. My kids now mid 20's and they still love boats. We were very careful during pregnancy fyi!!! We could not with the youngest. Here is a terrible story of why not to strap in. In Vermont a lady sprains her ankle badly on the Connecticut River. The rescue squad comes with their brand new Air Boat to navigate rocks etc. They strap her on a board to the boat and proceed to swamp the thing. Game over. She didn't make it. And she didn't want to go on it but they "persuaded" her. Ugh!

 

Congrats! Don't have much to add except what's been said above. I didn't take my daughter out until she was about a year and a half, but that wasn't for any particular reason. I took my son out when he was just a couple months old. We did use an infant life jacket, and Mom or I held him the whole time.

Plan on super short trips, and as they get older the trips can get longer. Some of the best advice I've heard was to bring lots of snacks, and be ready to leave at the drop of a hat. I really want to keep it fun for them so that they enjoy going with me as they grow up. I'm worried if I push too hard, they won't want to tag along. Bring games or anything to keep them occupied if you want to fish. Thankfully a dozen mud minnows in a bucket will keep my daughter entertained when a fish isn't on, but looking for shells and shark teeth on beaches/bars is always a good fallback plan.

edit -- @Kamtam made a great point about the boat ramp. If your wife is coming along as well, it's helpful for her to drive separately. That way you can drop her off at the ramp and keep the baby comfortable while you get the boat out of the water. It's also safer not to have your infant buckled into a truck on a slope right at the water's edge.

 

I've got a boy that just turned 4 and one thats about to two 2 this month. What i've found with the 4 year old is that it's super important to have all the snacks on the boat. Try to take a few toys to help keep them entertained. As soon as you can see them getting to where they are being done with the trip then head back to the ramp. Don't push your luck. My 4 year old HATED the baby life jackets when he was really little. When he got big enough to get a life jacket without the big pad behind the head was a huge deal and helped alot.

 

Don’t take a baby in the boat.
Disciplined toddlers are ok.

 

This^^^^^^^^
And don’t take more kids than you can rescue. One adult and two little kids means you could end up choosing which one to save. Two adults and two little kids barely gets you to a place where there is enough adult supervision in an emergency and maybe not even then.

 

I waited until mine was a little older.

 

Beanbag chair for mom and kid riding. Keeps them low center of gravity and comfortable. And for naps at the sandbar. Adjustable angle umbrella combined with a sea sucker extra strength rod holder means you can get shade anywhere on the boat, umbrella won’t fly away in the wind, and you don’t have to drill any holes to mount it! Keep it short, always have a slow route home for when the kid is grumpy and doesn’t wanna go fast. Also I found he doesn’t like the wind in his eyes so face him backwards running or get sunglasses he will wear.

 

If you have space, a pack and play with a crib sheet over the top works awesome to keep the sun off of them when boat is stopped and chilling.

 

Keep in mind that the most likely place to fall in is transiting between the boat and dock. Your best bet is putting the life on your little one in the parking lot and passing her from parent on the dock to parent in the boat rather than holding while stepping from 1 to the other.
Those infant life jackets rated for less than 30 pounds don’t have a listed minimum, but you will see in reviews that the baby really needs to be 8 or more. That was the case for us, so my daughter didn’t make it out until she was a month and a half.

We started her on the bigger boats at the club I work for, but she made the transition to the skiff easy enough. By 6 months she usually let us stay out 4 hours or so.
The life jacket pictured worked fine, and I liked the cloth support for her back when she was really little, but the decorative paint/ ink started marking our clothes after a year or so. We switched to a Stearns infant model that is easier to put on her and for her to get around in.
Stearns Infant Classic Series Vest https://a.co/d/i1OMNin

 

This is how I did it early on-

 

Congrats on the baby! I actually just went through this myself a couple years ago (daughter will turn 3 in June).

Personally, I say bring the baby on the boat, once she's about 6 months old! When you do though, this is not a normal boating trip. This is a slow going very thought out trip. If you get up on plane at all be prepared to come off frequently to mitigate impacts from other wakes or waves. Keep it as close to the marina/launch as you can, the day will be cut short for any number of reasons. Bring shade (a Bimini top works well) and something soft to lounge in. Depending on age of the kiddo, and if your wife is exclusively breast feeding, bring plenty of snacks, pouches (that's what we call those little to go fruit/veggie squeeze things), formula/milk, and some water. Also, unless changing a diaper or nursing this PFD stays on all times.

As a father to a toddler, and having plenty of friends with toddlers, there's no such thing as a well behaved toddler. They may sit there and listen better than many adults, however, their attention span is extremely short and their imagination is running rampant. You want this to be fun and make her beg to go out on the boat with daddy, not be scared by some angry adult yelling at her.

 

As a father to a toddler, and having plenty of friends with toddlers, there's no such thing as a well behaved toddler. They may sit there and listen better than many adults, however, their attention span is extremely short and their imagination is running rampant. You want this to be fun and make her beg to go out on the boat with daddy, not be scared by some angry adult yelling at her.

This last bit is also super important and probably the hardest to do

 

I see a couple of pix with the child wearing sunglasses. I was already wondering about this. I think eye protection is super important and we always had my daughter wearing them.

 

wearing Sunny’s is important but less so for kiddos. Generally speaking, the lenses if their eyes are ver flexible and they’re able to handle bright lights better. It’s why so many kids want to sit close to the TV.

 

PFD for sure our daughter sleeps like a rock in it, umbrella and like some have had before lots I repeat lots of snacks. also a huge help if you have the space is a bean bag. Of course pick your days the slop with mom and bay = bad day/short trip.

 

Bean bag with mom for sure. Had a buddy borrow mine last summer to take his friend and newish born on the boat, he said it worked great takes out the impact when hitting wake or chop

I think the kid was a lil older than newborn though