snapping turtles

[MossRoad]

Everyone is talking turtle soup but I am suprised nobody mentioned fried turtle. Many years ago when we moved to Florida people told me how good soft shell turtles tasted. Well I caught one crossing the road, took it home and cleaned it. My young wife (this was 30 years ago) said she would cook it but not eat any.
I cut it into small pieces and had her roll it in flour and fry it like chicken. It was absolutely delicious. I almost had to beg her to taste it and she finally did. Then, to my suprise, she ate as much of it as I did. After that I caught quite a few of them and she fried them all.
I am getting lazy and soft in my old age. Usually when you catch them crossing the road they are going to or coming from laying thier eggs. After cleaning a few that I found full of eggs I quit catching them.
And if you do decide to catch one, be careful as they do have a very nasty disposition when you mess with them.

Yeah. We were always more scared of the large soft shells than the snappers. The snappers were slow movers and you only had to worry about where their head was. The soft shells, on the other hand, were crazy fast movers with a really LOOOONG neck. We had a lot of trouble with them eating our trot line catches as a kid.

 

[creekbend]

Yeah. We were always more scared of the large soft shells than the snappers. The snappers were slow movers and you only had to worry about where their head was. The soft shells, on the other hand, were crazy fast movers with a really LOOOONG neck. We had a lot of trouble with them eating our trot line catches as a kid.

We also use to set out quite a few trot lines-jug lines too. www.lakejacksonturtles.org/softshell.pdf

 

[tsadjatko]

After trapping snapping turtles and getting rid of them you should invest in some of these and raise them - some sell for 2000 -5000 dollars.

 

[Brad_Blazer]

My brother Brian always keeps some snapping turtles for his school programs. He knows how to make them snap while he's holding them and it always gets a great response from the kids. Here's a video he posted with some of his critters - the first is a snapping turtle.
What Bothers Us? . . . (Carpenter Bees but not much else) - YouTube

 

[SPIKER]

back when I was outside all time used to catch a lot of of pretty much everything running crawling swimming or flying. rarely if ever had any issues cept for a quarter sized soft shell turtle that dang thing got a hold of the soft skin between thumb & pointer finger. thoowhee that bugger didnt want to let go. I think I was maybe 10~12yrs old at the time. MOMMY turtle came out after me as we were on her nest picking up the little buggers that bit me.

caught a lot of the snappers too. had a couple stringers of fish ate by turtles when we fished at night and at day like someone stated. had some soup a few times as well...

mark

 

[toppop52]

back when I was outside all time used to catch a lot of of pretty much everything running crawling swimming or flying. rarely if ever had any issues cept for a quarter sized soft shell turtle that dang thing got a hold of the soft skin between thumb & pointer finger. thoowhee that bugger didnt want to let go.

Did he jump up 3 1/2' to grab you? :laughing::laughing:

 

[SPIKER]

Did he jump up 3 1/2' to grab you? :laughing::laughing:

He Sure DID too bad he was attached to ME at the time he didnt have much of a choice but to fly into air as I jumped vertically hahaha. I think I had about 4 or 5 of them in my hand at the time as they were all over. the same hand has a large scar now between thumb and forefinger from a rusty pipe. running around corner of house and found a long ago abandoned ?? 2" rusty pipe left about 3' out of the ground. could not stop in time but managed to get my hand between the pipe and the ahhumm family jewels.

Mark