“Noodling”: Cooking Pasta or Catching Catfish

“Noodling” conjures up images of standing over a vat of boiling water, cooking some kind of Italian pasta to perfection.  This may be one definition of the term, but in reference to one of the oddest fishing styles known, it refers to the art of fishing for catfish using only bare hands and a big stick for prodding purposes.  That is correct; using only your bare hands to feel your way along the mud-caked bottom of a river in search of a catfish is called noodling. Better still, these catfish can weigh an awful lot.