I remember the first time I bought a piece of shark. I was nervous. The guy at the seafood counter didn’t seem to think it was a big deal. “It’s just a fish,” he said. “Grill it, maybe with a little mustard.”

But it was a big deal. I mean, I was planning to eat a piece of Jaws.

Of course, the kind of sharks that people eat aren’t the kind of sharks that eat people. But that’s easy to forget when you’re sinking your teeth in the flesh of a mako or a thresher. What you’re thinking is, “Who’s higher on the food chain now?”

Jaws was on my mind last week, after a brief encounter by with a female snapping turtle up at the Creek. I was crossing the dam of our big pond, admiring the freshly cut grass. I looked down, and there she was, rigid and motionless. I was in the crosshairs of her beady yellow eyes.

She was laying eggs. I knew this because her rump was settled into some soft mud she’d churned up with her hind legs. Also because she was giving me a look that said, “Can I please get some privacy here?”

I felt bad for her. Egg-laying is one of those secretive female activities you don’t want to be in the business of interrupting. It’s a time of great danger and exposure for the animal. She’s stuck there. Nothing is going to stop her, not even a biped in a ridiculous sunhat.

Still, let’s face it, snapping turtles are incredibly ugly, even at their most maternal.

We have some very large ones in our pond, the kind of snapper that could easily take a hand or foot. Early on, we admired these lumbering giants. When we saw a disturbance in the pond that looked like a pair of drowning dogs, we knew we were witnessing a spring milestone: the snappers’ underwater mating dance.

But what to do about these scary, beautiful beasts? The advice from our neighbors came in two categories:

1.    Leave those Prehistoric Natural Wonders alone; they’re not hurting anybody.

2.    Those Prehistoric Natural Wonders are delicious. Don’t be a fool, Pussycat, kill, kill!

My heart was with number 1, but I have to admit I was curious about number 2.

Last year, I came face to face with a snapper while I was fishing. I won’t go into the epic battle that ensued once I hooked him. I’ll simply cut to the part where I was scrambling backwards up the bank while the snarling, hissing two-foot monster with the razor-sharp beak was charging me.

After that, I revised my naturalist stance towards the snapping turtle. Now I consider him fair game.

The prospect of eating a turtle appeals to me. Our neighbors rave about turtle soup and fried turtle. Abraham Lincoln served turtle at his first inaugural in 1861. Pennsylvanians have enthused about the deliciousness of turtles for a long time. In fact, Harrisburg’s appetite for turtle soup made the headlines of the New York Times back on July 24th, 1887: “Snappers for Epicures, Relished as a Delicacy in Pennsylvania.”

The article praises the culinary quality of turtle meat, although it does exaggerate the ferocity of the snapping turtle. Slightly. “When angered, which it becomes on the slightest provocation, the snapper rises erect on its powerful legs, and, with its long neck extended to its full length, its tail straightened out like a small alligator, and its yellow eyes glaring with fury, it approaches the object of its rage by savage jumps, drawing its neck back into the shell and shooting it out again with lighting rapidity when within striking distance.”

Savage jumps? Please. That description sounds more like Mike Tyson than a turtle, but hey, they had to sell papers back in 1887, too.

I haven’t been able to get past the idea of butchering a turtle, though. Trolling the internet for helpful tips is likely to turn up gems such as, “Gaff its head; otherwise it may prove difficult to extend the neck for your hatchet.” Or, “Warning: a snapper’s jaws can deliver a vicious bite long after the head has been chopped off.” Or my personal favorite, “Turtle meat can convulse for hours after the animal is dead, which can lead to a lot of splashed marinade.”

You have to admire a headless creature that just won’t stop clawing and biting, despite being, uh, dead. Not to mention splashing marinade all over the kitchen. That’s the kind of can-do attitude that built this great country.

So maybe I’ll hold off for a while. There’s always mock turtle. You remember the mock turtle from Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, right? He’s the one who sang,

 “Beautiful Soup, so rich and green,
  Waiting in a hot tureen!
  Who for such dainties would not stoop?
  Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup!
  Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup!
      Beau—ootiful Soo—oop!
      Beau—ootiful Soo—oop!
  Soo—oop of the e—e—evening,
      Beautiful, beautiful Soup!”

This column was published in the Perry Co Times on 09 July 2009

For more information, please contact Mr. Olshan at writing@matthewolshan.com