The turtles seen sunning themselves on logs and along water's edge were called "cooters" by the natives who lived in the Cross Creek area of Florida, home of Marjorie Rawlings and The Yearling. The crackers may not have discriminated between hard shell and soft shell when it was on the way to dinner. Mencken states in his book "The American Language, Supplement one, that cooter is the word for a "box" turtle in the Carolinas and the name was derived from the African word, kuta or nkuda. He gives the scientific name as Costudo carolina which is of course a different animal from the soft shell turtle, a purely aquatic animal. Be that as it may - a turtle is a turtle to a hungry man.
Cooters available as an item on the menu of the Cross Creek Restaurant (about $18.00) are more than likely box turtles which weigh-in at about 3 or 4 pounds when full-grown (i.e., not eaten by an alligator.) The owner says they are deep fat fried in peanut oil and served with hush-puppies. Peanut oil may be the an improvement, health wise, over the old method which used bacon fat, but cannot possibly match the taste imparted by the smoky flavored bacon drippings. (Try frying eggs in bacon grease left over when it's cooked to crispness; there is no matching the taste; not even using butter as a media.) In addition to the cooters, you may want to try the frog legs served up piping hot at the restaurant.
Gopher turtles were called "Hoover chickens" during the depression and were a mainstay in the diet of early Floridians long before Mr. Hoover came along. When there were no paved roads in Florida, the stage coach (which was nothing but an open wagon) stopped while the driver picked up turtles along the way for sale in Tampa. He is said to have made more from selling the turtles than he was paid to make the run (Robert Lewis in "Journey to Matecumbe" (one of the islands in Florida's keys). The book is a sort of Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer narrative taking place after the Great War and provides lots of local color, which is well referenced by the author)
The Gopher burrows deep into the soft sand and his burrows are often inhabited by other wild life. Gophers are on the protected list of animals. (But many still find their way into the diet of man.)
These turtles are mostly vegetarians and accordingly the meat lacks the flavor(?) of the snapper. This doesn't take the snapper off the menu, just restricts the number of those that might choose to dine on it.
The snapper prefers meat in its diet. A single large snapper in a small pond can quickly depopulate the area of fish. The small ones it eats, and the larger ones it so damages that they die. Having exhausted its food supply, the turtle is not about to languish there in the "barrow pit, tank or sink hole" but ambles out in search of a new home. Often they are found miles away from any body of water.
All turtles are cold blooded animals and as such become more active as the temperature increases (and no doubt the snapper's bad temper as well). They are aggressive animals and the sharp hook nose can easily do major damage. In addition, to quote my mother, "If they get a-hold of you, they wont turn loose til it thunders" I can't vouch for this but as partial proof I relate the following observation. "When living on a small farm in West Tennessee, we had a tenant farmer who grew cotton in an area close by to a dug pond. One spring day he found a large snapper that must have weighed ten or more pounds along side one of the fence rows. With a single blow of his axe, he severed the head from the body and leaving the head and long neck where he found the turtle, brought the turtle up to the house for show and to request that he keep it. (There is little doubt that the turtle was going to be in a fine soup as soon as he got it home.) He told us where he had found it and that he had left the head alongside the row-ends. After school was out and the kids were home, we went down to see if we could find the spot. Sure enough laying there in the grass was the head. I took a small stick and touched the turtle's nose. Quicker than the eye could follow, the mouth opened and closed about the offered stick. And it wouldn't let go!" These animals rudimentary brain continues to function long after the head is severed from the body. (This is not too surprising as a chicken whose neck has been wrung to remove the head, still has the ability to run about.)
The green turtle which was for a time a much sought after species in demand by the diners on the continent was so called because its flesh was slightly green in colour, most likely due to its diet on plants which imparted the chlorophyll-green to the tissues. Attempts to raise them as a food animal have for the most part failed.
Maryland terrapin was considered a delicacy and great numbers were shipped to New York in boxes filled with straw or hay at the turn of the century. They were so plentiful on the Eastern Shore, that it is said a law was passed restricting feeding them to the slaves. (See Mencken)
Regardless of the turtle you choose for your culinary delight, you are feasting on a prehistoric animal first described in old Florida by William Bartram in his Travels. Perhaps with the return to the menu in a few select restaurants, turtle and terrapin will resume their rightful place as something to be eaten and enjoyed.
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