Those Tongue-eaters are Back!!! Ouch!

  They are back.  Maybe they never left but it seems that late fall is when their appearance becomes known to me.  More oft than not, it is this time of year when I encounter and invariably get bitten by the critters.  I am talking about the Cymothoa exigua which is a long name for a tiny crustacean.  Besides the obvious pain involved in its bite, it is the way this crustacean lives that makes it terrifying.

  The Cymothoa exigua is actually parasite of fish.  This tiny crustacean crawls into a fish's mouth and attaches itself to the tongue.  Once there, it draws blood from the fish and feeds.  Having the blood flow stopped, the tongue soon atrophies and fall off.  Not fun.  But!  This little stinker then fully attaches itself and "becomes" the fish's tongue.  That way the host fish can still feed and the parasite can remain inside for its whole life or that of the fish...whichever comes first.  Other than the obvious aggravation of having a parasite inside your mouth that you cannot remove (either because you cannot reach it or if you do remove it, you have no tongue and will die), there seems to be no side effects to the fish.  

  There are side effects to me, however, as those things bite...hard!  They are vicious little rascals!  I encounter most of them in my bait bucket.  This time of year, just about every menhaden out there has one of these as their tongue.  Well, let a minnow die in the bait bucket and the parasite immediately detaches itself and goes on the search of a new host.  Since all of the other minnows already house their very own ugly beast, the critter searches for the next best thing...usually my hand. The critter will latch onto your skin and not let go!  Not only do they hurt but the sheer terror of having something that is so creepy embedded on your finger is enough to send a normally sane person into a round of fits.  This afternoon, I was on the pier, shaking my hand like a crazy woman!  

  I had just caught a small redfish.  After unhooking it and releasing it, I reached down to rinse my hand in the bait bucket.  At the same time, my other line started whipping out.  Not thinking, I grabbed the pole with one hand and rinsed the other.  Geez!  The parasite latched onto my finger.  Now I was in a fine fix!  A fish on the line being held with the left hand and a critter attached to the finger on my right.  No matter how much I shook that hand, the parasite was not about to let go.  Ouch!!! That thing hurt!  Finally, I had the good sense to rub my hand against the pier post to dislodge the wee beast!  Whew!  All of that and the fish on the pole was nothing but a catfish!  That did it.  Fishing came to a halt for the day.