If you feel confident in the wild, do not get lost on African safaris and in the taiga, know how to handle guns and fishing rods and can feed yourself, if necessary, on a desert island, then our rating is for you. Join us and those who do not know what real hunting and fishing is. In search of exotic and completely unique experience in the extraction of the most unusual living creatures, we recommend going to Asia (Japan, Cambodia) and South America (Ecuador).
Moreover, no one requires any special skills from novice fishermen and hunters. You just need to listen carefully to the accompanying people, be dexterous and have strong nerves, because often after the hunt, the prey is tasting. And this test can be more difficult than the process of catching all kinds of edible animals.
Snakes in Okinawa, Japan
Okinawa, which is part of the southern Ryukyu archipelago in Japan, is called the island of centenarians. There are a lot of recipes for continuing life. One is to regularly consume snake wine called habushu. It is named after the local dangerous habu snake, which can reach a length of 2.7 meters.
The snake is preserved in alcohol directly in the bottle. It is believed that this wine also helps to increase potency, therefore it is used everywhere here. And to produce it, you need a bunch of live snakes. And here the snake-catchers come into play.
And you can't just take a car and go to the jungle to catch the hubu snakes. This requires a special license issued by the state. Therefore, everyone who wants to participate in the hunt for snakes must agree with licensed snake catchers (or a travel agency can do it for you).
Before going for snakes, you need to know the following:
- every hunter must protect his feet with rubber boots, which will protect against a possible snake bite;
- any snake catcher has special traps - long boxes with movable doors, at one end of which frogs are placed - snake bait;
- such traps are set in the evening, and the next day they are checked;
- you can also look for snakes in wildlife - they like to create holes under fallen trees;
- to catch them, you need to arm yourself with a tool - a stick with a lock at the end, with which they grip the snake and put it in a bag.
For one hunt, which lasts about 2 hours, snake catchers can catch 4-5 snakes worth about 13 thousand yen (130 dollars). Snakes are eagerly bought by restaurants in Tokyo and local habushu producers.
It is worth remembering that hubu bites can cause muscle paralysis and negatively affect the functioning of the heart and blood vessels.
Weevil larvae in Ecuador
The Amazonian lowlands in Ecuador have their own attractions. For example, here you can turn to the tribes that have lived all their life by the river, at the foot of the Andes, for help in organizing an interesting hunt - for the edible caterpillars of the palm weevil.
To do this, you will have to climb into the jungle in search of long-fallen (or deliberately felled) palms, which lay on the ground for about a month. The aborigines thus provide the palm weevil with its familiar habitat. Beetles lay larvae in rotting wood, which are then collected by people by splitting a palm trunk. We can say that the trunk is a special delicacy farm.
Palm trunks should be in the shade to keep the wood moist inside.
Weevil larvae are sometimes eaten raw. One larva can be two fingers thick and half a palm long. It has teeth, so it can bite an unlucky hunter. The head is torn off before use. The insides of the raw larvae taste like vanilla, but the shells are so tough that they seem rubbery. Weevil larvae can also be fried. They are strung on skewers and cooked over an open fire or baked in palm leaves. They taste like fried pork.
The larvae are considered to be very beneficial. Their meat helps with coughs, asthma, bronchitis.
Tarantulas in Cambodia
Cambodia needs to somehow compete with neighboring countries in the tourism field. That is why, for several years now, visitors have been lured to Cambodia with an unusual fun - the opportunity to hunt tarantulas, which can then be eaten.
Tarantulas are large, venomous spiders that live in burrows. The whole spider is eaten. It is pre-marinated in soy sauce, and then cooked in a pan with salt.
Tourist companies of the city of Sukon offer tarantula hunting. In principle, for help in organizing such an attraction, you can turn to any local resident who agrees to become your guide in the jungle. He will take you to the place where cashew trees grow, near which tarantulas like to settle.
They hunt spiders during the day when they sit in their nests and are afraid of noisy aliens. Tarantulas are caught by pushing sticks dipped in gasoline into their holes, because spiders cannot stand such an intense smell.
Spiders in Cambodia began to eat not because of the good life. In the 1970s, hunger reigned here, which prompted culinary experiments. Then everyone got used to the tarantulas on the plates, and now this dish is even considered a delicacy.
River fish in Japan
What can be exotic in fishing? Fish are caught everywhere in the same way, you say, and you will be wrong. In Japan, several cities (Gifu, Uji, Kyoto, Inuyama) offer completely unique cormorant fishing. With the help of specially trained birds, the great-grandfathers of the modern Japanese fished. In some places, these traditions are still alive.
The peculiarity of this fishing is that all the work of catching fish here is performed not by a person, but by a cormorant. To prevent the bird from swallowing the fish, a rope is thrown around its neck. When luck smiles at the cormorant, the owner drags him into the boat and confiscates the fish.
Cormorant fishing tours are very popular in Japan. Often, tourists will be immediately prepared what they could catch a cormorant, and there is no need to pay extra for this.
The best time for this type of fishing is from July to October. In winter, birds are not taken to the river.
