Barring the “Twilight” movies and “Interview with a Vampire”, there are almost no child vampires in popular books and movies. I’m talking about living children turned into undead vampires, not babies born to a new vampire race that will grow up like the pure-blood vampires in “Blade”. It turns out that there are several logical reasons for them to be rare to non-existent.
Their Odds of Survival
A vampire could suck out a pint or three before it kills you. This gives them time to pump in their own blood and “turn” you if desired. Turn that level of suction onto a baby, and you’ll get all the blood and some guts in the process. That makes it unlikely you could substitute vampire blood and get it circulating in the body in time to “turn” the baby. The child is far more likely to simply die. This precludes infants and young children being converted at the same rate as fed-upon adults.
The Threat to the Masquerade
While turning someone into a vampire may give them shape-shifting abilities and new senses, the vampire in human form is typically frozen into the human form they had when they died. Kill a teenager, and you’re a teenager forever unless you’re a bat. Kill an infant or toddler, and they’re permanently a baby or toddler.
The teen or adult has the level of intelligence they had as a human. An undead toddler won’t gain extra IQ points. They still have the intelligence and social sense of a toddler. Now you have to make sure undead baby doesn’t crawl off after a cat and get scorched by the sunrise. If you’re trying to masquerade as human, a baby gets in the way. A permanent 13 year old could be passed off as 10 to 15 – they could be made to look as if they aged. Furthermore, they can learn to lie about health conditions that stunt growth. Compare this to a toddler who never gets bigger and can’t follow the various rules meant to hide vampires from humanity. People will notice undead baby isn’t taken for walks, doesn’t grow, and doesn’t learn words. Two or three years later, it is obvious the toddler isn’t a four year old. Now you have to move more often. That’s inconvenient at best, a threat to the masquerade at worst.
Adult vampires can lie about being related to their prior aliases, saying that he was my father or grandfather. Baby vampires will become legends or easily identified members of the troop, both of which undermine the success or even survival of the group.
The Sheer Inconvenience of Permanent Babies
Is the hassle of a permanent baby worth the potential benefit of it as a lure? Perhaps, but you don’t need to turn a baby into a vampire to achieve this. And you can use a young looking child vampire for the same purpose plus lure would-be pedophiles. (Hat tip to the movie “What We Do in the Shadows” for presenting this as a tactic for child vampires.)
When you have a vampire baby, it needs constant supervision at night. Don’t want it in tow? Bummer, since it might eat any human nanny you hire. (This problem was presented in “Interview with a Vampire.) Yet little vampire will need to be fed. Complicating matters is how hard it may be to feed vampire baby. You have to bring the prey to it or have it lure prey to you, but it can’t catch prey on its own unless it can eat the wildlife. And then we’re back to having to supervise the vampire baby. I can’t imagine “True Blood” vampires interrupting sexual escapades to let a little vampire feed on the human lover. Thus the youngest vampire they showed was a 10-12 year old child smart enough to operate a smart phone and watch vampire porn. But we’re back to the “self-sufficient” age that could get away with living forever.
And if they made one by accident or on purpose, the odds are they’d be less tolerant of it than human parents, staking it as soon as they were done with it. After all, vampires are known for being soulless monsters. Go find a teen that is just thrilled at the idea of never growing up or loves your distant, broody demeanor. Or even borrow a living baby as a lure and get rid of it by whatever means you choose, if the tactic is so useful. Either way, you aren’t left with a screaming bundle of evil that could theoretically live forever.
Summary
Below a certain age, vampires may not be able to make someone a vampire, and they wouldn’t want them to become a vampire because they wouldn’t be able to survive on their own. This explains why there are so many teen vampires but almost no little vampires barring the vampires raising their own families, a la “The Littlest Vampire” movie.
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Photo by -Jérôme- 
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