If this isn't the biggest snapping turtle ever, it'll do until a bigger one comes along.
It's swimming beneath the ice in an Arkansas lake. It was spotted last week. The article has a picture of another big one after the text.
That image should make anyone think twice about swimming in some Arkansas lakes . . . you could lose some vital assets, up to and including a leg!
Peter
10 comments:
Leg? LEG??!! It could split him in two bites! The mouth is enormous!
I was out riding a graveled trail once, and saw two with about half that shell length hauled out and sunning. I had enough speed already to accelerate past before they could strike. Any slower, and I'd turn around. I saw another almost too late, when a "rock" about a foot long moved near my feet. Then I realized she was busy laying eggs. Probably why I still had toes.
I'm usually more worried about the catfish. There are floating islands on the Ohio and Mississippi, that sometimes float upstream. They're said to be trees and bushes growing on the back of a giant catfish. While that's a myth, the man eating catfish aren't.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kali_River_goonch_attacks
http://knowledgenuts.com/2013/09/15/the-giant-catfish-that-eat-humans/
Do you know how many quarts of snapper soup I could make from that turtle? I'm drooling.
Gerry
We have snappers that show up in our ponds. When they come out on the banks, we catch them, and then escort them lower down the creek so they don't eat up all of our baby fish. We have some that have been good size, but not 3 feet long, thankfully! The biggest was 16 inches. Heavy sucker though. Filled up a 4 gallon bucket pretty easily.
Around here, the females come out the first full moon after a rain in June to lay eggs. And yes, they don't care if the sandy gravel is a dam, a bank, or a gravel road. So the first week or so in June, driving up to what I thought was a bump or a lump of trash or a rock in the road, that then lunged for my tire...Michigan is a great state to see wildlife is all I'm going to say.
Amos Moses....
This ain't about a turtle, but sure 'nuff many a Cajun walking around on 4 or less toes due to looking for "turtle with their feet".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPa-xqTYd3A
A long time lurker, first time commenter.
The first thing I thought of was this song by Dave Hadfield.
https://youtu.be/o9g6yMA3aaE
Mike
At a local pond I fish frequently there is a huge male snapper (caught him in flagrante delicto with his date so I deduced he is a male) who has learned to associate my preferred spot on the bank with easy meals. I pull up there to fish and isn't too long before he shows up waiting for a stunned or discombobulated sunfish or crappie to hit the water. If I'm there too long without a catch he pops his head up right beside the bank and gives me a dirty look. I think he's annoyed I'm not making with the eats fast enough. He's not anywhere near the size of the one in the picture. He's 16 maybe 20 inches down the back. I've grown kinda fond of the old fellow so I try to make sure he gets something before I leave even if it's just a chunk of cut bait.
I once had somebody ask once how you fished for snappers, which really are quite tasty (as well as testy). I told them you don't. You hunt them with a shotgun, or a bow with an arrow tied to a cord if you're really adventurous.
Ok that's a serious monster. In my youth I've seen some in Connecticut ponds that were maybe 2-2.5' along the shell and you just didn't mess with them. Heads and neck are very fast even out of the water. That one has to be at least 3' along the back of the shell and I want nothing to do with it unless its in soup :-).
Alligator snappers get even larger than that.
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