Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire A smell so bad I can't think about it w/o gagging just a bit

Boys, having spent many years working in and knocking about fish houses I thought I had smelled every creature that swims in the Atlantic Ocean in various states of decomposition. Never in my life have I come across something that stank so bad it took your breath away. And the damn thing wasn't dead for thirty minutes. I give you The Loggerhead Turtle, Caretta caretta. This one was run over by a sixty foot yacht. And yes we had the wildlife guy with us, he said they do start to go ripe fast. This one was estimated to be twenty two to twenty seven years old.

Reminds me of a girl I dated...

Are they endangered? And how big was he? I don't know much about saltwater critters.


Travis

uh.....why did you take the smelly thing out of the water and put it on the deck?

The smell or the look?

I'm confused. Are you still talking about the girl, or shrecks' new pet?

Endangered yes, we called the Coasties and they called the turtle rescue guys. Very nice chap went with us to see if we could find it, a no schit nuclear physicist by day and a turtle rescuer in the late afternoons. Even he couldn't handle the smell and he does this for fun. They are going to necrop it and they actually have a turtle burial ground on Holdens Beach. Who knew.
The shell is about 3' long, 2 1/2' wide and he weighs about 150lbs.

Well actually neither my boat driver or I would have thought that a salt water critter would go bad that quick. You fish salt water, 30 mikes, in the water. Not even a bluefish will start to stink that quick. And they are going to necrop it so I did my part for the advancement of Marine Science.

So, do you think it's them shell noodles that stink or is it the leaking turtle fluids?

Ummm... That's a little odd.

That pic doesn't do him justice. That's a big fuggin' turtle!


Travis

Picture does make him look small, the gunnels on that boat are 2 1/2 feet wide, it's a 23 foot Jones Brother.

You sure you never dealt w crabs

Next one you find like that, grab ahold and hold it up for us.


Travis

That has been covered.


Travis

They ain't got to do no necropsy or autopsy or any other opsy on that stinkin thing. It's plain as day it got whacked with a propeller & even if it didn't get whacked with a propeller that's close enough. The results are the same as if it got whacked with a propeller.


Mike

Mike, I got a good look at the shell, crushed straight down by an azzhole hauling azz in his sixty foot boat. Same boat tore a floating dock off and into the aiww. And no I did not get it's name, something my boat driver has reminded me of several times, "you always get the name" or "I can't believe you didn't get the name".

Dead snapping turtles smell bad too...I can only imagine..

Whacked by a propeller weren't it ?

That's OK though sombody's gettin a big govmint grant to stir around in that stinkin critters stinkin insides & write down on a piece of paper "whacked by a propeller"


Mike

No, not any prop marks on it, trust me I know what prop marks look like. And the turtle folks are all volunteers, as far as I know both the Holdens Beach folks and the Topsail Island hospital are not state/federal funded.

dont know why but dead reptiles smell worse than any other dead critter....