h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Of course wading in the river is relaxing for you, you cruel fish-killers!!!! It's the home of FISH!!! Were you invited!?? NO!!!

I hope you know that fish poop in rivers...

Gotta eat something, and catfish are pretty tasty if prepared properly.

Dirt can taste good if prepared properly too... that's no excuse!!!

Apparently we're all meant to remain locked into sterile rooms with all other life forms filtered out so that us terrible, horrible, harmful human beings can never hurt another life form in the world through our awful practices of abusing said world by actually enjoying it for a change.

Ah, OK. I see your point. Shall I start with you, then? I've got a nice quiet room all ready for you. Don't mind the padding - it's dark, I know (electricity is produced by harmful processes), and very cold/hot at various times. There's nothing to eat there, either. Actually, we might have to kill you after all - your being here now consitutes a pretty serious offense to the environment, not to mention your use of an actual computer.

FWIW, to you fish-fiends or whatever you call yourselves, in the 20+ years I've fished, I only kept what I ate, and the vast majority (even trophy-size) I throw back.

And to Flyboy, these people are trolls more likely than not. *I* enjoyed the article - never been noodlin' meself, but out here in New Mexico (when the water's high enough) we got some of the best damn trout fishing around. Not to mention we're close to Colorado, where there's even better trout fishing, not to mention some great lakes. Ahhhh ... how relaxing. But I'm probably some evil butcher for even thinking that my presence in a lake or stream is anything but catastrophic.

Plllghhh... can't people get emotional and passionate for the sake of being emotional and passionate!???

Should've realized we were trying to rationalize with a muse ... Sound and fury is nothing without the accompanying storm. I like to get emotional and passionate for a reason.

Uhm ... getting worked up merely for the sake of getting worked up? Sounds pointless to me, what with all the genuinely nasty things we have in the world to get good and worked up about. No one's sayin' ya can't get emotional for the sake of getting emotional, babs, but don't 'spect me to sit here like a lump on a log and not say nothin' about it, if the though strikes me to. Not to mention, there's a "never cry wolf" kind of risk with your philosophy, but wait, I'm discussing with a MUSE? That explains it all.

Hee hee hee... yes you are!!! AND I'm female... how illogical and emotional can you get!??

I never knew it was called Noodlin'. My Dad used to tell us about the natives near where he grew up ticlking a fish's belly then throwing them over their shoulders onto the bank. He'd learned how to do it. We always thought it was another Dad Tale, along with catching a bird by putting salt on his tail, or killing a rabbit by putting pepper on a rock.(Am I going to catch hell for those tales!!!)

Selkirk, Manitoba, where I live, is the Catfish Capital of Canada - some huge catfish come out of the Red River. I personally, am not a fan, preferring jackfish (northern pike) or walleye, or perch fishing and eating myself. And I'm female, too. I've been fishing since I was 6 years old, and loving every moment of it. They say an hour spent fishing is an extra day in Heaven.

This is actually different from fish-tickling. There is no tickling involved, you just reach in and try to grab the catfish out (not as easy as it sounds). There are a lot of fish I prefer, but catfish is good if you can get rid of the muddy taste. If you leave the catfish alive in a pool of clean water overnight a lot of that taste will leave the meat, but then you have to worry about stray cats eating your fish in the middle of the night.

Time spent fishing earns you time in heaven!??... really... !!

Well, that's what they say.

Personally, I've never had catfish. Someone would have to prepare it for me - I don't think I could get by that head. The one's in the Red River are channel cats. We get the odd bullhead at various lakes where we've fished, and they aren't even allowed in our boat!

I live in Oklahoma. I'm not sure what kind of catfish we have, they're just referred to as catfish. When it came to preparing the fish we caught noodlin', we just handed them over to my friend's mother-in-law. She strung them up on the clothes-line pole and grabbed her sharpest knife. I've never seen anybody clean a fish so fast, start to finish in thirty seconds. Of course her son (my friend's brother-in-law) goes catfishin' all the time, so she's had plenty of practice.