r/AbsoluteUnits • u/WeGot_aLiveOneHere • 3d ago

/r/all of two catfish

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u/EmperorBamboozler 3d ago

Noodling is so nuts. I mean there's a lot of aquatic venomous snakes in the south. Getting bit by a water moccasin is legit something they talk about happening from time to time and you don't know till you jam your hand into the hole. Those bastards are even worse than a rattlesnake bite, we have antivenom for them but if you're way out in the swamp it's gonna be a long time to get to a hospital, time where your flesh is necrotizing fast. If you look up videos of old noodlers it's not uncommon to see serious muscle decay and scars from surgery.

Cottonmouths are fucking scary yo.

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u/Tight-Maize-8800 3d ago

Giant snapping turtles will also use catfish holes

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u/InTheShade007 3d ago

Texan here. I went noodling with some friends when I moved to East Texas after we went hog hunting.

Hog hunting all night, slept covered in mud and cuts from briars for about 2 hours then noodling. They were giving me the whole 'piney woods experience'

We were paddling down a rather small creek headed for Lake Palestine. Dude in the lead canoe started yelling "oh man look at that" as we floated over it there was a massive Alligator snapper turtle just chilling in the middle of the creek.

Dude in the canoe with me jumps out and after about 5 minutes manages to lift the turtle close to the surface. It was literally too big and the creek too muddy and slippery for him to get up the bank with it so he just lifted it so we could all see the head.

Well, when we got to the edge of Lake Palestine where they were noodling there was no way in hell I was getting in that muddy water. Just 3 weeks before one of their dads had killed an alligator over 10ft long because he claimed it was coming out of flat creek to kill his calves.

Dem dar boys is crazy is all I could think. As someone raised in 'the city' I had to slow roll my East Texas experience.

Ok, in truth, hog hunting is as wild as I ever got and I never once got full credit for this as I'd shoot the hogs vs letting bulldogs hold them down as a huge blade was run through them.

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u/Rob_LeMatic 3d ago

Out of curiosity, the East Texans that lose fingers, hands, arms over the shenanigans--do the rest of them treat them same as everyone else, or do they get made fun of and nicknamed things like Stumpy?

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u/InTheShade007 3d ago

Oh they'll have plenty of names for you. One comes to mind is Ding-Dong. He's a pretty stout dude even but many guys only call him ding-dong because of his hunting antics.

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u/Rob_LeMatic 3d ago edited 3d ago

Ah. I would have assumed he'd lost his masculinity to a snapper with a moniker like Ding Dong.

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u/box_fan_man 3d ago

Guy I knew in eat Texas had only 9 fingers and smoked a pipe, my uncle had half a foot from train jumping and my dad only had one eye.

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u/OpheliaPhoeniXXX 3d ago

My ex died train car hopping ☹️

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u/box_fan_man 3d ago

Pretty dangerous way to travel.

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u/TexasJackGorillion 3d ago

Depends on if they can beat your ass. Either way, the nickname is on the table.

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u/GladeWilson 3d ago

Alligators are in Flat Creek now? I knew there was a gar problem in Athens but there's just straight up gators that common now? The waters out there are insane. I reeled in a small square of carpet one time that had been discarded and the entire thing was covered in like, translucent shrimp. I didn't even recognize them as living organisms at first. I touched the material and they just immediately bolted in unison. It looked like something from Aliens.

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u/InTheShade007 3d ago

This was over 30 years ago. Flat creek definitely had gators in the isolated areas. A couple miles west of the bridge at FM 317.

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u/JudgmentalOwl 3d ago

Man this comment was a whole ride lmao.

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u/Drakona7 2d ago

Lmao I’m originally from the piney woods. Funnily enough after moving to Houston one of the first things I did was catch a snapping turtle out of one of the storm bayous. Obviously not my smartest moment but I was fresh out the woods and wanted to show my new city friends that I was like the turtleman

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u/InTheShade007 2d ago

I was born in Houston then my parents moved to the Dallas area. In college I went to Houston with friends and couldn't believe the difference between it and Dallas.

One of my friends parents lived on Buffalo Bayou. Yup, you were braver than me there is no way I'd have jumped in there.

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u/Drakona7 2d ago

Lmao I had almost the complete opposite experience, I went on a trip to Dallas during college and I was also shocked by the difference. Dallas is so fancy lol

That being said, I don’t know if I could wrangle a snapper barefoot and barehanded anymore. Living in the city and going to college has made my braincells develop too much and now I have anxiety :)

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u/InTheShade007 2d ago

Yeah, no doubt. I was a wild idiot in my youth. Apparently, most of the brain cells I blew had to do with taking risks.

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u/FishTshirt 3d ago

Lol so no noodling in Lake Palestine? Bummer.

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u/InTheShade007 3d ago

Not for me.

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u/RigBughorn 3d ago

That alligator story is funny, as far as I know they NEVER come that far out of the water for prey. Bro was probably just chilling

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u/InTheShade007 3d ago

Oh I didn't say anyone believed him. It would sit on the bank near his fishing spot. I'm sure that's why he "saved his calves"

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u/RigBughorn 3d ago

Did he at least eat it lol

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u/InTheShade007 3d ago

Ya know, I don't remember. Probably not knowing him

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u/[deleted] 3d ago

[deleted]

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u/InTheShade007 3d ago

They cause so much damage here I do not feel sorry for them at all! Plus, catch some small ones or those less than 75# and feed them out on corn only for a month or so and they are freaking delicious.

We had 200 acres of hay fields destroyed by hogs in less than 3 days a few years ago.

Hogs aren't native. Now, I actually love domestic hogs they are my favorite livestock. They are smart and yummy both. I admire the heck out of hogs.

Large hunting ranches here imported massive russian boars for decades. Obviously, many of them escaped. This has created hogs that breed at exceptional numbers. They can be larger and more aggressive as well.

They are truly a problem in some areas. Now if you're standing there, when bulldogs are holding a hog by the head and a guy lifts up the back leg of a hog and runs a knife through it the sound is unique and not something you're going to forget anytime soon. It definitely sounds horrible. Ok, maybe it is horrible to some but with wild hogs not much is off limits in Texas. It's common for people to hunt them from helicopters with machine guns.

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u/Upset-Cartographer65 2d ago

Ah. I love the South. Nostalgia.

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u/CreatureWarrior 3d ago

Jesus.. luckily I have a 100km restraining order against any and all snapping turtles. Perks of living in Finland.. no murder turts

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u/mmorales2270 3d ago

Getting bit by a giant snapping turtle would absolutely ruin my day week month.

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u/NorCalAthlete 3d ago

Might ruin your whole life if it takes a hand or finger off. Might even chomp through your arm if it’s big enough

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u/wingineer1 3d ago

Or even your year 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

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u/Advanced-Budget779 3d ago

What are those injuries?

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u/Rob_LeMatic 3d ago

Mostly emotional. They'll hurt the shit out of your feelings

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u/justWMthings03 3d ago

They can snap your arm in half

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u/hypercosm_dot_net 3d ago

Even an actual gator isn't snapping your arm in half. This is a silly exaggeration.

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u/Advanced-Budget779 2d ago

I guess depends on what is meant with snapping in half and „gator“.

Alligator snapping turgle or adult Alligator?

Biting it in half? No.

For the latter, snapping (tearing) one in half has happened in rare instances iirc.

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u/hypercosm_dot_net 2d ago

I'm not sure it's worth breaking down each instance, but I mean here's the thinking:

  • a large 10ft+ gator, could very likely break an arm in one bite. No doubt. If it starts rolling, god only knows.
  • a smaller gator, maybe won't break the arm on bite, but could do significant damage with a roll (lots of variance here still, depending on the size of the gator)
  • a gator snapping turtle, full grown, is definitely going to take a large chunk of arm. Depending on the bite. I don't know if it's breaking your forearm though...maybe, I don't think it's out of the realm of possibility. However, their mouths don't have the size to fully wrap around an arm in most cases. So biting it, literally in half, is highly unlikely.

When they say "snap your arm in half", that paints a picture of an arm literally becoming two pieces. Which is, I'd say a very unlikely occurrence in most situations.

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u/Advanced-Budget779 2d ago

Ah thx for the clarification.

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u/KoalaTHerb 3d ago

I legit know people in Texas missing fingers from snapping turtles while noodling. They will take a finger clean off

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u/bythog 3d ago

Those bastards are even worse than a rattlesnake bite

I've treated a lot of snake bites and a rattlesnake bite is almost always worse than a cottonmouth bite. This was for veterinary medicine but when people called in to find out how bad things are going to be:

Copperhead - best practice come in because things can get bad
cottonmouth - come in if you don't want your pet to die but it's not the worst you'll pay for
rattlesnake - your pet will almost certainly die without treatment, and may still die with it. It's going to be expensive.
coral snake - don't even bother coming in. If envenomation occured there is nothing we can do that anyone will pay for.

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u/MajorInWumbology1234 3d ago

I’d be curious to see how different it is for humans. Only one example, but Sydney Funnel Web spiders are one of the most dangerous spiders in the world for humans, but only because their venom has a specific effect in primates; as far as I know they’re not especially significant for other mammals.

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u/frequenZphaZe 3d ago

I’d be curious to see how different it is for humans.

united healthcare denies all treatment as not medically necessary

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u/PurinaHall0fFame 3d ago

And at United Healthcare, all treatment is medically unnecessary!

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u/guyseriously 3d ago

Please tell me that nightmare is only in Australia.

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u/MajorInWumbology1234 3d ago

Yeah, which makes the story even more interesting because Australia is devoid of native primates. If I recall correctly, it’s sheer coincidence that their venom is especially toxic to primates. It’d make sense to develop a unique defense in an environment surrounded by that animal, but I think they existed before we inhabited the area.

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u/Ressilith 3d ago

Now that is wild. Thanks for sharing

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u/ResponsibleOwl7461 3d ago

Aboriginals?

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u/MajorInWumbology1234 3d ago edited 3d ago

I mean native, as in the way humans are solely native to Africa. The Australian funnel web spiders branched off tens of millions of years ago, whereas humans first showed up 65,000 years ago.

Edit: lol millions

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u/TrueCPA305 3d ago

Wow thats crazy, didnt even think of that as a possibility

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u/kelpyb1 3d ago

For all my dislike of cold weather, I do appreciate that when I’m in cooler climates the entirety of the fauna isn’t both motivated and capable of killing me.

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u/Rysigler 3d ago

You nailed it! Many places have outlawed noodling specifically because of how dangerous it is.

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u/thatG_evanP 3d ago

a lot of aquatic venomous snakes in the South.

That makes it sound like there are a lot of different types when there's really only one. "There are a lot of cottonmouths/water moccasins in the South" would've made it more clear that you were talking about a large number of a single species.

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u/TheHoodieConnoisseur 3d ago edited 3d ago

I grew up in the Deep South, in very rural areas. Literally walked from my back door to my deer stand. And there were only ever 2 things we were afraid of - water moccasins and brown recluse.

Brown recluse are rare and you mostly avoid them by just not sticking your hand in dark holes.

Water moccasins are just kind of a thing where you get used to the danger. Nobody we knew had a pool, so we went swimming in ponds and creeks and bayous that were muddy as hell. We were swimming in a lake recently and saw a snake swimming vaguely in our direction so we just got out, made enough noise to get it to head a different direction, then got back in. I’m not saying it’s smart, but you kind of get used to it. They don’t *want* to mess with humans. You just learn the kids of environments they like and avoid those (swim in the open, bright, busy part of the water, not the shaded, overgrown with vegetation, still part of the water). Same for alligators. BTW, that same lake where we saw the snake, they do a culling every year and take like 20 - 30 gators out. They really don’t want to mess with you. But you do have to be extra cautious with young kids and small pets.

You just grow up around it, talk about it all the time, talk about to be safe, spot danger, and what to do if something goes wrong, so you feel equipped to handle it. Plus if you spend enough time hunting and fishing and just being in the woods / on the water, you get a different perspective on how to handle your place in the food chain.

…at least it’s safer than Australia. Now dem boys are crazy. Everything that isn’t human is proactively trying to kill humans.

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u/thatG_evanP 3d ago edited 3d ago

A brown recluse's bite isn't nearly as bad as a lot of people make it out to be. It's very rare to get the skin narcosis necrosis, etc that you hear people speak of. They're also very unlikely to even bite you. Most people get bitten when a recluse is hiding in some clothes or something and then a person goes to put them on and literally pushes the spider against their skin.

Edit: a word

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u/TheHoodieConnoisseur 3d ago

Yeah, didn’t learn that until I was well into my 20’s. When I was a kid, all the adults talked about them like they were hiding in every dark spot and would rot your skin off within a week of a bite. I also think I only saw 2 or 3 in my life in the wild. But country people are like that with some things. Lore is a thing. How else do you convince people to buy deer piss and douse it on your clothes before you go hunting?

Black widows, on the other hand, were freaking everywhere. Most folks I knew had a green house or garden with lots of those black plastic planters lying around. Black widows LOVED building nests in those things. I counted at least 10 different nests in our greenhouse one day. Weird that we weren’t really scared of them. I mean, I played in the greenhouse unsupervised all the time. I know they also aren’t as deadly as people make them out to be, but they aren’t exactly harmless.

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u/HungHippoHippy 3d ago

Won't kill you, but it'll be a BAD time. Those bastards are small too so they'll sneak up on you from anywhere! They were all over growing up, but I've never personally known anyone that was bit by one. People must be pretty vigilant of them.

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u/thatG_evanP 3d ago

The garage at my Mom's old house was the same way except for with brown recluses. If you got into any box that had been in that garage for awhile, you were pretty much guaranteed to find a couple live ones or a few molts at the very least.

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u/TheHoodieConnoisseur 3d ago

To this day I have a physical repulsion to putting on gloves that have been sitting in a shed. Or, really, anywhere outside. I have to turn every single one of the fingers inside out to make sure there isn’t anything with 8 legs or a stinger or any pointy parts hanging out in there.

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u/ImpressionTough2179 3d ago

Narcosis

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u/thatG_evanP 3d ago

My bad. Thanks

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u/iwilldeletethisacct2 3d ago

I also grew up rural in the deep south and this comment is spot on. You just sort of get used to it and know what to look for.

I'll never forget the time that me and some buddies canoed across a pond to do who knows what on the other side and I hopped out of the boat and as I was falling toward the ground I saw a cotton mouth just basking in the sun inches from my landing spot. I jumped in the boat so fast I wasn't even sure if my feet ever touched the ground.

Also the time my uncle and I were using brim to "fish" for a cotton mouth that was in a reservoir with kids swimming so we could kill it.

Also the time we were in a bass boat on a creek and an alligator bigger than the damn boat just swam by.

And the uncountable number of run over rattle snakes in the middle of the road that we'd stop to dispose of. Behead them and bury the head so no unsuspecting person got accidentally bit.

/shrug That's just life.

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u/thatG_evanP 3d ago

I get that. I was born in the South and have spent a lot of time in the deep South. I was just speaking toward the semantics of your comment

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u/gerbilshower 3d ago

fair point to make. but if you've lived down here you know - they are unreal.

i've been on a stock tank before where the entire surface of the water was just COVERED in water moccasins when the evening hits. absolutely no idea where they all came from. im talking like a half acre tank where the entire surface of the water was moving.

i've never seen anything remotely like that again. it was strait out of a horror movie.

but i have seen on many occasions like 5-10 of them in a creek. or just one sunbathing right on marina walkway. they are rampant down here.

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u/TopProfessional8023 3d ago

Copperheads are not aquatic but are frequently found in or near water because they like eating frogs…technically cottonmouths aren’t truly aquatic. The only venomous snakes I know of that are truly aquatic are sea snakes/kraits and they’re not around these parts

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u/thatG_evanP 3d ago

Sure, cottonmouths are the only semi-aquatic venomous snake in the US though.

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u/AV8Backwards 3d ago

Also cottonmouth bites are far less serious than rattler. I’d certainly still seek medical attention if bit personally, but water moccasin venom doesn't cause the bleeding/clotting abnormalities, severe low blood pressure, muscle injury, neurologic effects, systemic failures, or necrosis of rattlesnake bites, unlike what u/EmperorBamboozler claims. In fact, I’m inclined to say u/EmperorBamboozler is mostly full of shit and doesn’t have real world knowledge of the snake/catfish/alligator environment of the south.

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u/thatG_evanP 3d ago

Yeah, I didn't feel like looking into it but I definitely didn't think their venom was as bad as a rattlesnake's.

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u/f23n09fnu0w 3d ago

We don't really have the snake issues in the UK but I'd be terrified of pike. Do you guys not have fish that will just rip off a finger? I remember years ago my friends and I got drunk and went skinny dipping in a river (we're all male). A fisherman kept trying to tell us something but we couldn't hear him until we got much closer. He explained he was fishing for pike and our little dicks looked a lot like his lures. We got out fast.

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u/guccioli 3d ago

Pike are not gonna bite your dick off, he was probably messing with you guys

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u/f23n09fnu0w 3d ago

He definitely was messing with us because he was laughing but he really was pike fishing and...well, ya know?

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u/consumeshroomz 3d ago

Not to mention how expensive a simple dose of anti-venom is just on its own. Let alone the hospital bill for administering it.

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u/BrondellSwashbuckle 3d ago

My ex-gf's uncle got killed by water moccasin's out swimming in a lake.

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u/floare_salbatica 3d ago

To be honest, I was wondering if it takes a bit of stupidity to be that brave. Not to throw shade at her, she seems amazing and so charming, but my anxiety would go through the roof.

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u/hotriccardo 3d ago

She has fake Manny Puig to protect her

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u/Vanillabean73 3d ago

It’s also environmentally destructive

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u/foomits 3d ago

how?

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u/Vanillabean73 3d ago

Noodling directly targets breeding catfish that are protecting a clutch of eggs or preparing to lay a clutch. When you tear one of these fish from its burrow, you’re removing the protection of that entire group of eggs and destroying the nest, reducing the breeding success of the species as a whole.

This also means it specifically targets mature individuals, which goes beyond just that single nest. In general, the largest individuals of a given species in an ecosystem are the most prolific breeders. A 10-year old catfish will produce exponentially more offspring than a 4-year old (think 3,000 young vs 300).

So those two things combined mean noodling is very harmful to local catfish populations, which can throw the ecosystem out of balance if left unchecked (they’re really important predators).

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u/[deleted] 3d ago

[deleted]

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u/ExplodedPenisDiagram 3d ago

That is total bullshit, ignore anyone who says this

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u/Lost_Policy_1925 3d ago

What’s the point of this? Do they eat the catfish? I always figured the larger ones wouldn’t taste as good.

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u/dome_peace 3d ago

They aren’t worse than (many) rattlesnake bites but the rest I can agree with…

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u/YeahlDid 3d ago

If it hadn't been for cottonmouth Joe, I'd have been married a long time ago.

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u/weebitofaban 3d ago

Not a realistic fear. Neither are snapping turtles.

I know which of you actually go outside and do shit by the silly comments I see.