While budget negotiations were teetering on the brink of collapse Thursday, state senators took action to legalize hand fishing, called noodling, in Texas. Right now the fine is $500 for noodling in Texas.
For those of you who live to catch catfish with your bare hands (and happen to live in Texas), you can now rest easy in the knowledge that your avocation of choice- “noodling”- has been legalized by the Texas Legislature. Yes, having evidently solved all other pressing problems facing the Lone Star State (How ‘bout that $28 billion hole in the budget?), legislators figured it was time to remove the criminal stigma long attached to the “sport” of noodling (not to be confused with trout tickling).
Simply put, noodling involves putting one’s hand into a catfish hole. If things go as planned, a catfish (they’re not noted for their intellectual agility) will swim forward and latch onto a noodler’s hand, usually in a defensive move as it tries to escape its hole. A noodler can then grab onto the catfish’s gills and…Voila!!…one catfish done got hisself noodled. As you might imagine, it’s a Southern thing. Growing up in Minnesota, I’m not sure it would have occurred to a fisherman to try and catch a catfish with his bare hands. That’s why we have fishing rods (and in Arkansas they use dynamite)…right??
Fortunately for Texas’ noodlers, they can come out of the dark and proudly claim their place as legal sport fishermen. Me? Well, I may no longer live in Texas…but even when I did, I’m not sure the idea of noodling would EVER have been my avocation of choice. I always thought a catfish’s natural habitat was a frying pan…after been dipped in egg batter and breaded, of course….
