Keith Lusher 04.28.25
As a child, I can keep in mind the nights when my cousin and I’d stroll the path that meandered by way of the swamp. Our eyes scanned the darkness searching for two small yellow dots shining again at us. I’d shine the highlight, and he would do the gigging. After the frog was on the gig, we’d slam it down into an aluminum garbage can that we took turns dragging behind us.
On a mean evening, we’d catch between 20-30 frogs to fry up. As I received older and realized extra about frogging, I spotted that there was an easier technique to do it, which required solely a vibrant highlight and a ship.
That’s how Peyton Clement of Loranger, LA, has been doing all of it his life. Clement frogs the Manchac Swamp in Southeast Louisiana and has perfected catching frogs into an artwork kind. “I’ve been doing this since I used to be a child,” he mentioned. “My buddies and I’d go up and down the bayous selecting up frogs wherever we might shine them. We’d get 50 frogs an evening and convey them again to the camp to scrub and fry up.”
Whereas most froggers use a gig, Clement mentioned there’s a neater means. “All we use is a robust highlight,” he mentioned. Clement positions himself on the bow of the flatboat whereas the motive force shines the sunshine on the financial institution, searching for a pair of eyes reflecting again. After the eyes give the frog away, the motive force turns the boat and goals it proper on the frog on the shoreline. “It’s necessary to maintain that mild pointed on the frog as a result of it distracts them lengthy sufficient for the individual on the boat’s bow to seize it. The one factor that scares them is that if the boat pushes waves up onto the shore,” he mentioned. Cement mentioned the vast majority of the frogs he catches are on the shore. “Whereas a lot of the frogs we catch in Manchac are on the shoreline, you begin to discover extra frogs within the hyacinth and lilies the additional south you go. We went to Bayou Gauche simply south of LaPlace, they usually have been all within the floating grass.”
Clement mentioned he prefers catching frogs on the shoreline as a result of it’s simpler to seize them when there’s exhausting land beneath their our bodies. Plus, they’re simply exhausting to identify within the water. The 20-year-old mentioned his favourite situation to go frogging is when the tide is low. “Typically there will likely be 4 toes of shoreline uncovered, and that’s when it’s very easy to identify them,” he mentioned.
Because the boat nears the shoreline, Clement makes use of an overhand method that brings his hand straight down over the frog. After getting them within the boat, he grabs the frog’s two legs and slams them towards the facet of the boat to knock it out. After that, it’s straight into the ice chest.
At first look, the cleansing course of might look intimidating, however Clement mentioned it’s truly fairly easy.
When cleansing the frog, lay it on its stomach and minimize round its waist with scissors.
Subsequent, minimize off the toes, then pull the pores and skin down from the waist towards the legs such as you’re pulling its pants down.
Then minimize the legs off on the base, rinse with clear water, and also you’re carried out.
For cooking, soak the legs in milk for an hour to take away any fishy style, then fry in butter or bread and deep-fry like rooster wings for a scrumptious swamp-to-table meal.
