The Battle of the Bog Beast

By: Coyote Peterson

August 16, 2009…the morning air was warm and the sun was already cooking away the previous evening’s moisture as I sat on the back of the Jeep waiting for my colleague to arrive. We had planned this trip in advance...a small bog that resided in the strangest of areas…smack dab in the middle of a quaint little town they called Gahanna. I singled the spot out months earlier when I witnessed an old man feeding two large snapping turtles from the community board walk as small children and elderly women looked on. Oohing, and awing as the beasts rose to the surface to snatch and snap up pieces of stale wheat bread. I remember standing by as an on-looker thinking to myself…these people are nuts…than again…it was really I who was nuts… cause if the crowd in this all too public of a place wasn’t present…I would be waste deep chasing these monsters around in the muck like a kid in a candy store with an open tab. The bog was my playground and these swamp things were my candy…but patience is everything when it comes to going face to face with an animal that is anything but friendly. So I waited.

Nearly 3 months had passed and for a period of time I forgot about this strange bog that people avoided like a terminal illness by walking over the city funded and constructed board walk. Then it hit me…like a shot of wild turkey in the middle of the afternoon, this was a place to catch some monster turtles but to do so I was going to have to go early in the morning…when the old women, children and fancy pant onlookers wouldn’t be present. The last thing you want to do when wrestling with beasts of the swamp is to garner a large crowd…crowds lead to all sorts of terrible things that I will not mention here. Either way…the table had been set and this very morning I found myself eager with anticipation for a shot at landing a real sizable turtle.

The set up was perfect…we parked the Jeep in a parking garage that for the most part was completely vacant. The town, despite its rural setting, was actually quite city like…fancy restaurants, hair salons, manicure parlors, magnificent landscaping and yes…a parking garage. We must have looked like a couple of loonies, my colleague outfitted in photographers gear and myself in the typical turtle capturing attire…dirty looking shorts, a straw hat and rubber boots. We weren’t coming to get our nail done…that was for God damn sure.

As we meandered down the neatly laid cement walkway toward the board walk we chatted about the fucked up things that booze and drugs can turn a Saturday night into. My colleague did a fine job of becoming a reptile himself the night before and it was quite admirable that he pressed beyond the hangover to make it out with me for this expedition. You know a partner in crime is a good partner if he can tie one on until three in the morning, manage to abandon his car, wallet and cell phone and still make it to your meeting point by 9 am. Little did he know…the sense of being hung over was soon going to pass and instead become a crazy rush of blood and adrenaline to the head.

Arriving at the spot where I had previously seen some prehistoric prospects we were defeated to find that the drought of summer had taken with it all signs of standing water. All that was left of the old man’s feeding grounds was a pile of dried logs and hazardous looking muck…so thick and foul smelling that even a wild hog would probably opt for something a little classier. It would seem that our morning expedition had come to a screeching halt…disappointment would be an understatement. Fuck the doomed we told ourselves and made an about face to return to the Jeep and head home defeated. Than a little light clicked on in the far back of my brain…could have been my pituitary gland trying to talk some sense into me…not sure about that, but either way…I suddenly remembered that there was a little marshy area just up from where we stood a ways…and maybe…just maybe there would be some standing water that would provide a late summer refuge for a bog beast.

Walking around a bend on the board walk I could see that water was still present in the spot I had remembered…not 30 seconds later I looked out into this water and saw the enormous head and shell of a Snapping Turtle basking in the morning sunlight. I hollered to my colleague that I had a turtle in my sights…get the camera equipment ready you crazy bastard…it was show time at the Apollo! The board walk was about 9 feet in the air from the bog…without hesitation I quickly leapt the railing and descended into the cat tails and thorn bushes, pushing back reeds and battling off large swamp spiders with a stick. My good God I hate swamp spiders and these foul fanged varmints where everywhere. It didn’t matter, spiders the size of garbage trucks couldn’t keep me from taking a legitimate shot at catching a mammoth turtle. I thrashed about in the underbrush like a mad man…The turtle just sat there…watching me approach the edge of the water…and I thought to myself…this is going to be a cake walk. With confidence in stride I took my first step toward the muddy water and as that same stride landed I suddenly found myself waist deep in some sort of foulness that cannot be described in words. My good God I did not see that coming. Literally a foot from the shore the mud was so deep and thick that I nearly lost my boot just trying to get back out. Standing in disbelief I looked back up to the board walk where my colleague comfortably, and cleanly shot photographs…photographs that seemed to be the hunter defeated by mud that was thicker than glue. “Did you see that shit!” I yelled up to him,… he was convinced the battle was over before it even began… but I was resilient. If there is one thing that I hate…it’s seeing a turtle and not being able to make an attempt at capture. It is one thing to give your all and have a beast evade your maneuvers…it is another thing to have a monster of the marsh sit back comfortable as a clam and think to itself that there is no way you will ever get to me…silly human.

Little did this beast realize…he was dealing with no ordinary city human, he was dealing with a human that is without question missing several screws..while the rest of them are so loose that it is a wonder to even believe that they are still holding on. I called up to my colleague…”it is time to build a bog bridge!” He told me I was crazy, and I agreed. In that moment I began pulling every log that I could find from the surrounding forest floor and carefully began laying them out onto the muddy bog surface. The plan was to build a support system of logs on which I could basically float the moat and get nearly 25 feet out to the turtle. For a good 35 minutes I worked the forest, tearing down dead trees and slowly balancing and building my way further out into the bog. In most areas the muck was deep, easily 5 feet and well up to if not over my chest. The toughest part is that it wasn’t like going through lake mud…there was no water…this was straight MUCK…thick, filled with dying plants, logs, sticks and all sorts of foulness that was blacker than the dark side of the moon. Finally…the bridge got me about 5 feet from the turtle, whose shell was still floating on the top layer of the pond weed.

Using two sticks like ski poles to balance myself I walked 20 feet out onto the bog surface…I was all sorts of nervous…I had no real idea how deep the muck was this far out…and if I went in and it was over my head…I was a goner. Using one of my balance sticks I reached out and tapped on the turtles shell, first trying to make sure his head was away from me…and secondly to make sure that he was really still there. I hoped to get really lucky, maybe be able to coax him in my direction, maybe get a grasp on him and somehow drag him back to shore. This plan quickly fell apart when my tapping led to the monster wanting to take off in completely the opposite direction of my bog bridge. Fuck it…I didn’t work this hard building the “Oregon Trail” of bridges to let this beast evade my capture…as a wise doctor once said, “buy the ticket take the ride” life is about taking risks and this was definitely one of those moments where you either risk it all…or you go home wondering what could have happened had you taken that risk.

I went for it…jumping feet first into the muck my body hurled in after the fleeing snapping turtle. I landed just behind him and grabbed onto the back of his shell. The mud immediately swallowed me up to the middle of my chest. Jesus Christ this was dangerous, and insane…and fucking INSANE! I had a 30 lb snapping turtle now by the back of the shell and the tail and he was pissed off as shit in a shit storm…and here I was…STUCK IN MUCK UP TO MY NECK! My colleague called to me from the board walk…well…I’m not sure he called to me…but I did hear…”Holy shit you got him!” This is when the battle royal began. Man vs. Mother Nature and Man vs. Beast. Not only was I going to have to fight what was now about 30 feet of bog…I also had a monster of a turtle that I needed to wrestle back through it.

I have done many exhausting things in my life…this one tops them all. As I felt myself sinking deeper I took a breath and gained my composure. This was it…I didn’t come this far to let go of the turtle so it was going to be a fight to the finish. I lifted with every ounce of strength I had and brought the turtle to the surface of the mud, its jaws open wide, its head lashing back, hoping to take a chunk of my face with each and every bite. I have never had a turtle this big, this close to my face before and it was scary to say the least. Usually when capturing large turtles you try to stay in water, shallow water, where the turtle can be kept low and away from the body…today…I had the beast right up next to me and together we would fight a 30 minute battle for the rights to the bog. He wanted to get deeper in…I wanted to get the hell out.

As I made my first few moves back toward shore, dragging myself and the turtle in the mud I looked up toward the board walk where my colleague’s camera snapped repetitively capturing every moment of the battle. I was already exhausted and all I wanted to do was get to my bog bridge…if I could get to the logs I could use them to balance myself and the turtle and work my way back to land. Mud was splashing everywhere…the turtle’s back legs kicking, its claws digging into my hands. This fucker was strong, one of those classic Brando pissed off strongs where you don’t dare try to stand up for yourself, let alone resist the strong arm that beats you. Yet I remind you dear reader…screws…loose, most of them already let go…so rational thinking and reasoning doesn’t apply to me.

I was exhausted, that kind of Jello feeling began to take over in my forearms and biceps that you get after a solid 2 hours at the gym…and I had only been in the fight about 10 minutes. I let go with my right hand for a split second to wipe mud from the corner of my eye and the beast tried to escape. Digging deep into the mud, its claws and webbed feet carried it into the darkness of the muck but I refused to give up and I held on. The turtle was sinking me, he had become completely submerged, my arms were completely below the surface, my head struggling to keep afloat, my body was now shoulder deep…it was this moment where I felt that if I didn’t pull it together here and now…all of the effort would have gone to waste…and the turtle would have escaped, ousted me against my will and I than would be left in a mud covered defeat. With a power breath and a heave, my legs shaking and fighting the sinking mud, in that instance I found a burst of power and brought the animal back to the surface, swinging him up into the air and my body around just in time to find the log bridge. I paused, breathed heavily and called to my colleague…get the camera ready partner…we’re coming in!

I battled the last 15 feet of the bog with relative ease, using the logs to support the turtle and my weight against the powers of the deep mud, basically sliding on my stomach like an eel. Mother Nature finally gave in and allowed me to escape her grasp as my boots touched down on solid ground and I lifted the 30 lb turtle onto shore. From there it was a short fight up to the board walk where I lifted the beast up and placed it on the wooden boards like it was a box of cereal on the top shelf. Hoisting myself up I jumped the railing back into civilization, mud and gunk splashing all over the pristine wooden board walk…and at the foot of my boots sat a really pissed off snapping turtle. The beast had been captured, Mother Nature had been defeated and now it was time to get some really great photography.

We walked the turtle down to a nearby river where together we went into the shallows and I cleaned it off. Spiffing the monster up for the camera… the turtle was a male, right around the 30 lb mark, with a carapace about 16 inches long, a decent size for any turtle of this area. I estimated the beast to be between 25 and 30 years judging by the platelet rings on the carapace. When we had our fill of photographs we thanked the turtle for its cooperation and took the walk back to where he was captured. Climbing back down to the edge of the bog I gently set him on the mud and said good bye. It was an incredible journey, and we were both happy to return to our respective worlds having both garnered one hell of a mutual respect for one another after the battle of the bog.