When it comes to fishing the flats of Florida or Belize, Costa Rica or Mexico, you can't do better for a guide than Mr. Henry Waszczuk. If you check out his TV show, Fishing the Flats, you're guaranteed week after week of exciting trips to far-flung locales all in the pursuit of nature's most challenging sport fish.
Waszczuk is an unlikely provider of fishing the flats TV. Born in England in'50, he crossed the pond with his family as a toddler. Football was his first love, playing for Kent State, and later professionally, before setting down to teach high school Science for a decade or so. It was around this time he began fishing the flats in Florida and elsewhere.
The appeal of fly fishing the flats is easy to understand. Perched on a fishing platform on a typical shallow water skiff, an angler first of all takes in great scenery. To fish the flats means to enjoy the peace of the Florida shoreline, with miles of salt marshes, native birds and swaying pine trees.
Then there's the thrill known only to the angler who dares to fish the flats of the Florida Keys for tarpon, a creature known to tip the scales at one hundred pounds. Speaking of fishing the flats in Florida, feisty reds can also be found in the mangroves of Clearwater, an experience unequaled for those seeking pristine outdoors scenes.
When fishing the flats in Florida, the choices of site are endless. If you don't want to worry about tides, you could fish the flats around Mosquito Lagoon, or the Banana River Lagoon. This area is part of the Indian River Lagoon system, world famous for its redfish.
Down around Sanibel and Captiva Island in the southwestern part of the state offers the chance to fish the flats for snook, tarpon and sea trout. To fish the flats here, which are thick with turtle grass and studded with oyster shell bars, is practically guaranteeing catching some redfish, which hunt the baitfish hiding in the oyster shells.
Exotic locals alone do not make for riveting Fishing the flats TV. Your host, Henry Waszczuk, also provides knowledgeable guidance on gear. What kind of skiff is required to fish the flats of St. Augustine for flounder, for example? What kind of rod is best, what kind of line, what kind of lure?
And of course, there's always the Everglades National Park in the southern part of the state. Fishing the flat waters of the Everglades is an angler's dream, providing not only excellent shallow water fishing, but the chance to see up close the best of Florida's wild animal and plant life. Truly, the hardest part of fishing the flats in Florida is choosing where to go.
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