Can anyone help with what you need to put a low whistle (metal) through an amp without simply playing next to an amp. Is there a pickup which works and what else would you need to buy? I have an amp for base guitar. It would be a great help. Cheers!!
Life would be simpler if that worked, wouldn’t it? 
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Microphone: dynamic mike or self-powered condenser mike. Shure SM58 or SM57 works fine.
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Microphone stand.
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Low impedance XLR microphone cable.
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Line transformer/adaptor, XLR to 1/4-inch, low-impedance to high-impedance.
Instead of #4, you can also feed the microphone into a mini mixer like a Behringer 502, then run a 1/4-inch guitar cable from the mixer to the amp. This gives you a preamp and EQ and level on the board for better control.
I have played through Shure mics, and they are excellent. Small tip now. If you play with a group, and use a monitor. Make sure you are not on the same monitor as the trap set. All you will hear is the trap set.
Sorry about the last question . I must have been dreaming. I meant to ask if anyone can advise on playing through an amp using a pickup attached to the whistle as opposed to through a mike that you play next to. Thanks for the responses.
It happens.
Pickups work on the principle of capturing something other than sound in air - strings vibrating in a magnetic field, a solid surface vibrating a piece of quartz, etc. But since whistles and other wind instruments produce basically only air vibration, you need a microphone of some kind.
There are various mike arrangements other than mike-on-stand that can work if you need freedom of movement. The target zone to mike is the area near the fipple window. Some people use headset mikes with the element positioned near the window. Or there are small electret or condenser mikes that can be attached to the whistle and pointed at the window - though obviously, this may be awkward with smaller whistles like a standard high D. You could always try cobbling something together with a cheap Radio Shack type electret and a battery.
In either case, most good quality mini mikes will give a low impedance (lo-Z) output. So you still need the XLR cable + transformer to feed to a high-impedance (hi-Z) bass amp, or use a mixing board in between. MicroVox electret mikes are an exception, with a hi-Z 1/4 inch output. Also, wireless receiver units for headset mikes may offer a hi-Z line level output you can feed to an amp.
One big advantage to using a stand-mounted mike is the ability to control both the distance and position of the whistle with respect to the microphone to vary both volume and tone. This is a big plus with whistle, which has fairly limited dynamics control, and is the reason most players prefer this arrangement. One of the joys of seeing Brian Finnegan perform in concert recently was watching him “play the mike” as a integral part of his virtuoso technique.
Ice pick grip and a 10 lb mallet 
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Mick
I thought of that, too, but I wasn’t going to go there. 
One word - Microvox.
Get one of their mini swan neck mics http://www.microvox.co.uk/flutepage.htm, which wrap round the barrel of the low whistle (no damage or permanent attachments) and point the mic at the fipple.
Plug that into the mandatory microvox pre-amp (get the more expensive ones with the volume control so you can turn yourself down between numbers to avoid broadcasting your private conversations, move the mic from instrument to instrument, etc).
Attach that to your amp; you might want to DI it or put it through a mini-mixer, but there’s plenty of signal to go straight into the desk.
Result - amplified low whistle heaven. I’ve had a succession of Microvox systems for many years, and in a huge variety of amplified settings have never had a single solitary professional sound engineer complain about the level, or quality of signal, or, well, anything.
The only drawbacks are you can’t do instantaneous changes from instrument to instrument, and (as already stated) you can’t move around the mixed mic position for effect, so you’re better using a Shure SM57 on a boom stand for certain concert circumstances: but if those aren’t imperatives, you will not find a better solution to what you’re after.