MORAY EEL ATTACK

What does it feel like to be bit and held onto by a moray eel's multiple jaws of teeth?  "EEL-ise" aka Elise Minichiello earned her name 20 miles off the coast of CA while collecting scallops when she was attacked by a California moray.  

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Transcript

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Moray Eel Attack Survivor -  Elise Minichiello
The TEETH Podcast - Season 1, Episode 4

Note: The TEETH Podcast has been created for the ear and is meant to be heard. If you are able, we encourage you to listen to the audio, which includes emotions, music, and sound effects that do not translate to print. We generate transcripts that we hope make for enjoyable reading using a combination of speech recognition software and human transcribers, and may contain errors. Please confirm the corresponding audio before quoting in print.


Jeremy: Moray eels do not brush or floss, which results in leftover flesh from their victims ending up lodged in between their multiple rows of razor-sharp teeth. These small chunks of carcass will remain stuck between their teeth until they literally rot away. However long that takes. As you can imagine, anywhere there is rotting flesh there is going to be an aggressive amount of bacteria. A moray’s bite does not have an electric shock or venom, but it is loaded with bacteria. So much in fact, that a not-properly-treated bite wound will easily become infected and spread to the victim’s bloodstream, causing septicemia or sepsis, which very often, leads to death. 

Elise: I basically was paddling a kayak with one hand, even though you need two hands to paddle a kayak. I just remember it was my right hand so every left hand stroke I was like, alright and then I’d go to paddle on the right and would be basically chumming the water myself. There goes all of this blood, there's blood all over the kayak, I can't think straight– I’ve gotta get back to work!

Jeremy: You are listening to the Teeth Podcast: wild animal attack stories directly from the survivors. My name is Jeremy Carberry– I am a wilderness kayak guide, animal handler, the survivor of a few attacks myself, and your host.

What exactly happens to cause a moray eel to attack? Also, how could someone survive being exposed to all the bacteria from a bite without getting treatment from a hospital, or antibiotics? Well, I found the person who can answer these questions based on firsthand experience.

Elise: My name is Elise (E-L-I-S-E) and I got bit by an eel, all of a sudden my alter ego “Eel”ise comes to fruition. I was meant to be eaten by this eel, it's okay. One of my friends once, we were talking about this– this is really funny. She was like what if your name was Rachel,would the eel still have gotten you? Yeah, Rach”eel”.

Jeremy: Elise was attacked by a moray eel while harvesting scallops off of Santa Cruz Island. Santa Cruz is part of the Channel Islands, which is a wilderness area 20+ miles or 32+ kilometers off the coast of California and even further from anything resembling a hospital.

Elise: I'd been working at the Channel Islands National Park since 2017 as a sea cave kayak guide. We take the boat out with all the clients and we give our kayak tour, but then we'll stay for a night– up to four nights in a row. You wake up, you go do your tour, and then you go to bed, And then you do it all again, with a little bit of drinking and fishing and rowdiness in between– just a little bit, just a little.

Jeremy: I first met Elise on Santa Cruz Island in 2019, the summer of the eel attack. She was 27 years old. Because of our distance from the mainland, the national park has less pollution in the air and water, creating clearer dive visibility than the mainland. The north side of Santa Cruz Island is made up of massive rock cliffs. The cliffs usually start underwater for about 30 ft or 10  m and then shoot up hundreds of feet tall creating breathtaking views. The rock walls have cracks and caves that provide plenty of underwater hideaways for wildlife including urchin, scallops, and morays.

Elise: Eels are blind. Eels can't really see a dang thing so their best way of hunting is their sense of smell. They have a really, really good sense of smell, so if you take a piece of squid or some scallop guts and you dunk it in the water, they pick up on that like really, really quick– instantly. They'll blindly slither toward the smell and they latch on.

Jeremy: If you're asking yourself, Why would someone risk being bit or even losing a finger to the terrifying jaws of a moray eel? That's because you probably haven't tasted a purple-hinged rock scallop. Most people have not. That's because you can't buy them in a store, restaurant, or anywhere– it's a recreational take-only species. The only way to get them is to get a fishing license and get into the water yourself. Is it worth the risk and effort? Even after the attack, Elise says, “Definitely.”

Honestly, I'm a little hesitant letting you in on how good these scallops really are. But, I'm going to because it's essential to understand Elise's motivation of being in the water that morning. This prized scallop species that Elise was going after has been analyzed by a professional taste panel at San Diego State University. Compared to common brands of commercial scallops that you can purchase in a store or restaurant, by almost all criteria, purple-hinged ranked superior. If it's not the most delicious thing I've ever eaten, it's in my top 5. Straight out of the shell and raw, the adductor muscle is so tender that you don't even have to chew it. 

The flavor is also amazingly not fishy or seafood tasting at all. There's a subtle sweetness to it that can't be compared to anything else. My favorite way to eat them is lightly seared in some garlic and butter, but they go good with just about anything: tacos, scrambled eggs, grilled cheese, ramen, etc.

Elise is not known as being particularly generous with sharing the scallops she collects, probably because of the effort involved in finding, collecting, and cleaning them. There's also a daily limit of 10. However, she's been very generous with sharing her knowledge– which is very rare among fisher people.

Elise: With scallops, they have to constantly be underwater. They can't move like crabs for instance, so you have to dive down and get them. The big ones that you want, like the size of dinner plates sometimes, they're as far down as they can get– that's for protection from the sun, protection from drying out. So you go at a low tide and those scallops are kind of right there for you. You don't have to dive, you don't have to hold your breath for very long, especially once I got the technology to dive for scallops a.k.a. a glorified crowbar with an abalone bar! You go down, you see the scallop with its red lips– these are just rock scallops, wedged in the rock– and then come up, take a breath, go down, get it off the rock, then you just put it in your bag. I would not call myself a free diver, just a glorified snorkel scallop queen.

Jeremy: Snorkeler with benefits.

Elise: Yeah! 

Jeremy: One of the potential liabilities to weigh against the benefits of scalloping are potential injuries from urchin. There are multiple species of urchin and they are very plentiful in the water surrounding the Channel Islands. People have different reactions to the urchin injuries– the spines from different species length, size, sharpness, and venom.

An urchin fisherman in the Channel Islands permanently lost the ability to make a fist after a bad urchin stab in his hand. I've personally ended up in the hospital once from urchin spines but the Scallop Queen Elise's body has somehow evolved some kind of natural immunity to the spiny invertebrates.

Elise: I don't wear gloves, and I’ve got a lot of urchin in my hands. Urchin are everywhere. Actually, I have a lot of them in my feet too, you kick them and the spine gets into you. When you have to pry these scallops off the rock, there are urchin around and the urchin aren't scattering away, so sometimes when you're in there with the abalone iron crowbar to get the scallops off the wall, that pressure of you finally releasing the scallop from the wall, your hand smashes into the rock and the urchin and the spines break off. It’s one of their defense mechanisms so you can’t blame them!

Jeremy: They break off into your body.

Elise: Yes!  

9:13 - EEL TEETH 

Jeremy: 
Other than the very sharp urchin spines to be aware of, there are also moray eel teeth. Their teeth are distributed along two sets of jaws– one set of jaws that you can see as the moray is opening and closing its mouth– where you would expect to see the jaws of an eel– and another set of jaws further down the throat to hold prey in place and make it harder for that prey to escape.

When morays latch onto something with all those teeth, they usually roll their entire body repeatedly to rip off chunks of flesh– the same way an alligator or a crocodile does. Elise had never seen a moray eel underwater off of Santa Cruz Island leading up to the attack, but was very aware that they lived there and knew of the potential damage an eel can inflict.

Elise: For scuba divers, for people who dive for scallops for people who dive down in general to stick their hands into crevices or put their hand in the wrong part in the rock and the eels they get you and they literally take fingers off– it's a very common ailment.

Jeremy: Morays are nocturnal hunters but occasionally are active

during the day, especially if they smell something dead or wounded. Like sharks, they are an essential part of the ocean’s clean-up crew, and cut down on disease being spread by rotting animals. The California Moray range from Point Conception to Baja, Mexico, and are the only species that live off the western coast of the continental U.S. We know for sure that Elise was attacked by a California Moray. Larger and healthier populations of moray eels are usually found in and around marine-protected areas, which is exactly where Elise is hunting scallops.

11:23 - 6:53AM, JULY 21st, 2019

It’s the very early morning of July 21st, 2019. We are on the Northside of Santa Cruz Island. Us kayak guides refer to early morning missions that are not work-related as 'dawn patrol'. In order to wake up before the sun, there has to be a really good reason.

Elise: Low tide means less breath holds, so I can get to the big scallops faster. I have a picture of me and two of my coworkers, Ruby and Pat, before we went out. It was tagged at 6:53 and it's like ‘We're coming for you, scallops!’ and we look really tired and the sun's just starting to come up.

Pat: Elise is bombastic, energetic, and clever. She's very good at entertaining people and sometimes can seem like a clown, but usually she knows what she's talking about.

Jeremy: Pat Makiri is Elise’s friend and coworker who was with her throughout the entire ordeal that morning. Pat has had encounters with California Moray Eels before the morning of this incident. He recalls one instance after he had shot a fish and was preparing it…

Pat: I was cleaning a fish over a little pool of water and I had no idea there's an eel around and as I was cleaning the fish, this eel appeared, and it just swiped the fish guts from right below my feet. 

Jeremy: That experience and others with moray eels left a deep down mostly subconscious connection for Pat.

Pat: I remember talking about uncomfortable feelings in my body and my therapist asked me to paint a picture with these uncomfortable feelings, and the first image that popped into my mind was an eel.

I’m pretty sure this would have been before the event with Elise. Eels for me represent something super shadowy and untrustworthy and that I can't fully comprehend like what they're thinking or feeling. They don't seem like a sentient being, they have some supernatural power or something divine, maybe evil about them.

Jeremy: Morays all have beady eyes, super sharp teeth and, unlike fish or snakes, smooth slimy skin without scales. Since they don't have gill flaps, they need to constantly open and close their mouths to pull and push water over their gills which adds to their terrifying demeanor. 

14:35 -

HOW TO SCALLOP

In order to legally collect scallops you need to be outside of any protected waters. At 6:53 a.m.,

the dawn patrol crew of Elise, Pat, and Ruby…

Elise: We go kayak out of the marine-protected area and the tide was so low, then you have to beach your kayak somewhere on the island so you can go dive around. So we beached our kayaks and just started diving around and this is all before our normal kayak work. You're allowed 10 scallops in your possession at one time, and I think I got 10. It was pretty easy diving because the tide was so low. I remember pulling up this monster one, putting it in my bag, and I was like, ‘Oh heck yeah like that's going to be good later’. So Step 1 of scalloping, you go outside the MPA, Step 2 you go pick up your 10 scallops like I said, crow barring them off the rock, you put them in your bag. Step 3 is actually getting the meat out of the scallop. If you think about a scallop that you've had at a fancy restaurant or in a seafood dish, it's just a circular white disc but there's a lot of other gunk around it. I'm putting that in the best way possible– it's disgusting. A lot of the gunk you got to get off of it so we do that out of the water. Then you just throw the guts back in. Kind of a weird ritual that I do when I go scallop diving, when I clean them, I get back on the beach and I kind of sort them. and I always save the biggest one for last because it's like the trophy.

I was sitting on a pretty large rock, had my knife out, again taking all the guts out and just throwing the guts pretty far. It's not like I just dump them at my feet– that’s gross. I get my last big one and I remember taking the shell off and it was like a really large disc I was really stoked about it and I looked over my friend Pat who was on the beach and I was like, ‘Hey I really want a picture of this’ because it's big and I want evidence.


16:48 - THE ATTACK

I take the scallop and I'm like all right, I just want to give it one more dunk. Into like, what? Three inch water. It still had some sand on it, some vein on it, so I put it into the water and I remember like something wasn't right, and something felt weird and it hurt a lot. I took my hand up out of the water, there's a 2 ft California Moray Eel attached to my hand.

Jeremy: If you're picturing a 2 ft long snake, change that up. Moray eels are very tall and wide. Imagine a 2 ft long log with a lot of really sharp teeth.

Elise: At this point my brain was lagging, I wasn't really registering what was fully happening– I knew it hurt a lot and I knew this is not what your hand is supposed to look like and I knew that it wasn't good and I needed to do something about it and what are you supposed to do when there's an eel, I don’t know you just shake it, just ‘Wah!’

Pat: I just heard her scream. I think my thought was like, ‘Oh she cut herself on something’ because it was kind of like a shriek that could be interpreted like many ways it wasn't like an ‘Oh my God’ like and then when I turned around and just saw this eel attached to her I had no thoughts, my mind was blank, I couldn’t even process it. 

Elise: I don't know what Pat was doing at this point— not taking a video or a picture because that would have been sick. 

Pat: There might have been enough time to take a picture but I would’ve had to have been very cat-like.  

Elise: My biggest concern was, I have an eel on my hand! So I was just shaking it/ shaking it/ shaking it, screaming.
Pat: The eel was just whipping back-and-forth and it just didn’t wanna come off.

And then the next thing I knew, it was off.

Elise:  It flung away behind me and I remember looking back at it and I was like, Oh my God,  and there’s this eel flapping around on the rock. For a split second was like, Uh oh, is it gonna die? But my brain went automatically to, ‘Where is my scallop?’

And not gonna lie with my gushing, bleeding finger I looked into the water. I was like, ‘Where is it? Something happened!’ And at Pat, ‘Oh my God!’ Blood is just running on my finger, I’m like kind of skimming through the rocks, the eels just withering in the background.

Pat: It was clear that the eel got the best one, the eel struck at the exact moment to get the best scallop. She was pissed, she really wanted it back.

Elise:There was no scallop! At that point I was just like, ‘All right, something is happening to me.’ I’m a wilderness first responder, I’ve been getting my wilderness first responder training for a lot of years, and a lot of times in those WFR classes they talk about shock. They talk about, Oh your client or your patients going into shock– it’s like this far off thing. I was going into shock and now if I ever find someone who’s going into shock I know what that feels like because that was me. The blood is rushing from my finger. I’m like, Huh!

Pat: She was freaking out and she clearly went into shock very fast. Her symptoms were pretty much silence mixed with a face of terror. I could almost see the thoughts pouring out of her mind: worst case scenarios, like what’s gonna happen to me. 

Jeremy: Elise was experiencing psychosomatic shock. The third friend, Ruby, had gone back to get ready for work a little before the attack happened so now it was just Elise and Pat.  

Elise: Pat’s like, ‘Oh my God what do we do? I’m like, ‘I don’t know.’ This starts the whole thing of like, ‘I don’t know! I don’t know.’ That’s like my mantra for the next hour, ‘I don’t know.’ 

Pat: It was a trip and I’ve been in a few situations in my life where I’ve seen people in shock. I was sympathizing but also trying to detach so that I could be of service to her, I knew if I went into any kind of shock myself I would be less useful. Immediately your mind sharpens– my experiences [have been] my mind sharpens really quickly. 

Elise: I don’t know it sounds kind of wimpy being like yeah my whole middle finger was cut but it was a lot of blood, and it was coming out pretty fast, and it’s just not something you expect to happen– to get bitten by an eel during a very routine procedure. I’ve cleaned scallops so many times even at that exact same beach. I know what I’m doing– a lot of times people hear the story and they’re like, What, were you in the water were you sticking your hand into a hole? …like that’s how a lot of scuba divers lose their fingers, you just stick your hand in the hole and there’s an eel in there and then they take the top of your finger off!  No, I knew what I was doing, I’ve done this 1 million times when you go scalloping out of scorpion Anchorage you have to kayak 10 minutes or so out of the marine protected area so we’re at least a 10 minute kayak away my hand is gushing blood I know it’s gonna take longer than 10 minutes to get back I’m worried about missing work and with my training and patch training really well we got to stop the bleeding somehow. 

I’m worried about missing work and with my training and pastoring really well we gotta stop the bleeding somehow we don’t have a lot of material I am in just a full body wetsuit bleeding and sucking wet and I knew like any bandages wouldn’t stay on and I had brought a quick dry shirt and so it was such a nice who’s such a nice shirt and I just got them I’m on my vacation to Florida and I had like crocodiles on it and I was really stoked on it it was the only thing we had that I took this lovely baby blue shirt and wrapped it around my bloody finger and that shirt still has your blood on it as much as I hate that it’s good story like 

Pat:
anytime feels like a recipe for disaster like the space kit like certain Animals can sense when you’re stressed and I just felt like a like a dog I don’t want to mess with that. like I don’t want it more variables to enter this scenario than necessary clearly we need to get back 

24:09 - WE NEED TO GET BACK

Elise: Pat was like, ‘Should I tow you back?’ ‘I don’t know.’ ‘Can you paddle?’ ‘Yeah, I… don’t know.’ I didn’t really know what was going on. My brain… it just shut down a little, but I knew I had to go back to work. 

Pat: I just did whatever I could to get her in her boat.  

Elise: I’m in shock again like, ‘We gotta go.’ I’m just monotone ‘I can do it.’ He’s like, ‘Okay.’ I'm shaking, he’s like, ‘Okay, I’ll push you off. Are you okay?’ I’m like, ‘Where are my scallops?’ ‘They’re here.’ ‘Okay, good! Give them to me!’ I had my bag of scallops still, I wasn't just gonna abandon them.  

Pat pushed my boat out of the cove and we started paddling back.
We’re paddling back and I remember, it was on my right hand, and I paddled with my left and then with a kayak you paddled with your right. As I was paddling with my right, I was barely gripping the paddle but blood was just chumming the water behind me and I was like, Hm, sharks. Hm. There’s blood all over this kayak, ooh, we’re still a long way away.

25:26

Pat:

I definitely remember liking having mixed strategies like some moments just like staying quiet and like just trying to lead her and myself by paddling and then other moments where I just like talking to her like I don’t worry you’re gonna be OK you’re gonna be OK. I was like that like they don’t worry you’re gonna be OK you’re gonna be OK I was like that at the time I was pretty sure of that but there’s also a little sliver of doubt. 

26:01
Elise: so thankful I Pat there just having someone be like are you okay do you want me to tell you it's like no don't tell me you know I'm just like leaving a trail of blood behind me I don't know and we get back to the beach and work has already started like we are late we are officially late to work. It's before a boat full of over 100 people supposed to show up I'm supposed to give a kayak tour we're supposed to be tip top shape all the characters supposed to be out all the gear supposed to be out and here comes Elise typical covered in blood just just out of her mind luckily one of my best friends I just in general in life and one of my favorite co-workers Sarah was on the beach and she knows me very very well Pat pulls his kayak up and is like oh oh like something's wrong!"

He pulls my kayak up and there's just blood all over my kayak there's blood like coming up on the rocks and Sarah I think she told me she was like I saw your face and I knew this was not a joke this was not some like Elise antique this was like serious Sarah brought me up to our little kayak area which is it's just a bunch of sheds it's not a hospital it's not even a nurse station right it's a bunch of sheds we're on an island 25 30 miles off the coast like what are you supposed to do and thank goodness Sarah is a smart girl and a really good wilderness first responder.

27:37 - WILDERNESS FIRST AID

Sarah irrigated it a lot. It was a really, really deep cut. At one point she physically had to peel me out of my wetsuit because I just wasn't moving. I was just sitting there and she was like you're freezing right now I'm like I don't know, No, maybe? I don't know." “Yes you are.” no it's okay she literally sits me down and I remember her like just stripping me out of my wetsuit and I'm just like okay cuz I couldn't do anything else she was like well we got to put a pound and there's a funny picture on my Instagram in this giant blue paddle jacket I don't know like she bandage it up and everything and like no sooner had she done that then here come our hundred plus clients like happiest can be followed like leaded by our Island manager Kyle who's a really close friend of mine too and and like at that point I was like but I feel like at this point kyle like Elise again? I've been around him for a few years (I get into some stuff). He sat down with me and he's like ‘hey what happened?’ I was like, “I got bit by an eel” he's like ‘what?!’ and I'm like ‘I don't know’ like in shock he was like ‘well can you lead a tour?’ I'm like ‘I don't know’ he was like, ‘Okay, guess I’m hitting the water’. 

Jeremy: The manager, Kyle, decided he was not going to be a manager that day and instead take out the people that Elise would have taken out on her so Elise could rest.  

Elise: That was that, like in a fog cow is like stay away from the clients kind of like no State relax I'm just like I don't know like walking around in this giant paddle jacket just like my fingers all bandaged up at this point but like still the medical shock of it all there's nothing we could do about it I don't know it was nine in the morning you can't get stitches like I'm not I love Sarah but she's not giving me stitches you just kind of have to sit it out and wait and we just had it bandage the whole day and that's what's gnarly about living and working on the island like something happens you know you're stuck . I sound really weak but it was it wasn't it was intense. 

Also by this point All the boat crew know all the boat crew new all the rangers knew half of the Clyde's new cuz I'm just walking around

Patrick: She wanted all the sympathy and glory she could get, and she deserved. SHe’s slinging this story left and right, like look at this, I got attacked by an eel, it was crazy! 

Classic Elise.

Jeremy: Sarah, who originally cleaned and bandaged the wound had to go lead a kayak tour and a few hours later when she got back she immediately checked up on Elise.

 Elise: She came back and was like, “How are you?” “I’m good, I don’t know“ ”Let’s rebandage you” and she did. 

31:22 - BACK TO THE MAINLAND

Jeremy: The general rule for wilderness emergency is that someone's life needs to be on the line in order to send out a rescue helicopter. This was not the case with Elise so she had to wait with everyone else for the regularly scheduled afternoon ferry from Santa Cruz Island to Ventura harbor on the mainland. It had been a full 9-10 hours Finally got to the mainland into a legit medical facility 

Elise: I get to the mainland, I go to the urgent care because it’s an animal bite and it was irrigated on an island and they’re like ‘oh we can’t take your insurance right now’. Goodbye 

Jeremy: This is extremely frustrating!  I’m grateful to live in this country but our medical system needs to be evaluated this exact same things happened to me multiple times went to Hospital urgent care doesn’t accept my insurance do you want tell me a specific answer of how much it will cost and if I really push thousands of dollars to check a laceration or whatever it is. remember when I was talking about the risk of sepsis an infection that moved the survival rate of six this is only 60% and it’s not entirely out of the question for Elise specially given the circumstances of the bite and not having a treated in a proper medical facility it’s been a really long day and Elise decide to go home out of frustration I would’ve too in this situation.

Elise: And then the next day I remember calling a doctor that I used to go to and the only person who could see me was like the geriatric Center which wasn’t my normal doctor but like I wanted to get in and see what was up then so I get back Sunday on Monday I go to a doctor will give you a tetanus shot and there’s not much else we can do I was like sick that’s it send me on my way I said keep it clean and I think I had a lot of schoolwork to do the next day and that was like 

33:39-

HEALING

Jeremy: Three days after the attack Elise’s finger was not exactly properly healed up yet but she was back on the island leading kayak tours. 

Elise: Yeah, by Wednesday I was back at it with a cool story. It’s funny because a lot of times on the kayak tours clients are like, Oh what’s the gnarliest thing you’ve seen? What's the craziest thing that’s happened on a tour? And I have a new answer to that question!
 from then on I just had this wall for a while for a few weeks I had this big gash in my finger just went on living… until I went home for my family vacation.
I got bit in July I was home by the second week of August in Maine up with my aunt and uncle and family, and all of a sudden I noticed– I was looking at my finger and it was healing kind of weird, like there’s definitely a really large crease forming. There’s some white thing sticking out of my finger. I was like, Huh that’s weird and I was poking it and I was like I don’t know what that is. But I do kind of know what it is because I have a science degree, I have taken my Wilderness First Responders,  is very very white this thing that’s sticking out of my finger but it’s not my bone like it’s not finger bone like I know that it’s very, very small. 
I was in Maine for a week and a half and over the next few days my finger slowly started like peeling back on itself, which sounds gross, felt like that’s what was happening and it was a tooth! My aunt– she’s a funny one– she’s like oh my God let me pull it out let me pull it out I’m like it’s not ready to come out like straight up I was, I wasn’t scared but I was like a little nervous about it like I was like yeah that is not a part of my finger that is a part of this eel like it is in me and I’m like no not ye. Every day like around 5 o’clock, she’d be like “Let me pull it out, let me pull the tooth out!”

It was the second last day we were in Maine and I was like, OK fine like you can pull the tooth out, and she did. It was an eel tooth, straight up.

Jeremy: The  for multiple weeks and miraculously didn’t cause an infection at least credits her friend’s  very thorough in multiple cleanings of the bite bad day 

Elise: again shout out to Sarah for cleaning it

No stitches no infection no antibiotics just a tetanus shot 

Jeremy: Sarah definitely deserves a gold medal of wilderness first response is that doesn’t exist it should since the attack Elise is definitely spent some time replaying exactly what happened that morning 

Elise: Moray eels actually have two jaws, they have their first job which is kind of like fangs, more like a snake and those first teeth they are the attackers they like snapped down on and then they have a second jaw full of very, very very small razor-sharp teeth like we’re talking like maybe a millimeter maybe two and those teeth are used to slash up whatever is in his mouth so I had one of those slasher teeth

I think in my scientific opinion, that Yo smell the scallop lashed onto the big boy scallop with his big big big teeth and then tried to I mean I was I was shaking it off that point it’s freaking out it’s probably trying to like slash up whatever’s left and yeah it left it left part of itself inside me and I do still have the tooth it’s taped to a sticky note and I’m waiting for someone who will help me turn it into a ring I really want to put the tooth in resin and I really want to make a ring for my ear finger so if you know anything of anyone who makes jewelry like seriously, I still have it on a sticky note in my room.

Jeremy: Let’s make it happen!  Anybody listening who has those abilities or knows someone  will pay for your services reach out to Alicia or me and O I’ll pass your message along.

I first heard of this story with a couple other guys and after we heard the story one of those guys said if Elise was cleaning scallops why didn’t she just use the knife to stab the eel?

Elise: Valid boys, I guess…

Jeremy: also they weren’t in that situation

Elise: Exactly! and that’s what I was gonna say like until you have a 2 foot you attach your hand you don’t know like yeah yes I did have a nice but in the moment I’ve just felt this insanity pain and I don’t know I don’t even know where my knife ended up I might’ve not even had my knife in my hand at that point this sounds very vain the whole point of this was to get a nice juicy picture of this huge scallop OK I’ll admit it right so I wanted documentation of this really beautiful scallop.

Yes no I was not being stupid OK I was completely out of the water it was an extremely low tide away an eagle hunts is through its sense of smell so their sense of smell is insane and OK yeah I was kind of trimming the water around me but I was also completely out of the water again only my ankles were in the water and I don’t know how to seal squirmed out but for for reference how many times you’ve been in this exact same situation gosh so many like I’ve been scouting for years at this point and multiple times that season probably even because I was out there for four days probably even within that four day island run so this is not this is not like good oh and I was trying this new thing out like this is very routine

Jeremy: Other than Elise not dying from sepsis, my favorite part of this whole story is still that scallop Elise has ever found didn’t get right back to the mainland prepare them and even talk a really beautiful photo of the bounty if you wanna see that photo and a few others of a lease before and after the attack you can sign up for our email list at theteethpod.com I’ve also posted a video I’ve never put up anywhere before all the California more under the water in the exact same area it’s a short video but it’s really cool it’s possible it was even the same meal as for Elise and her finger now… 

Elise: my nail is still really messed up. It’s like growing out. Yeah over two years at this point and I still have a little flap but I also have a pretty significant like cutting mine in my nail so I think it really really tore up my nail bed I also I kinda don’t want to get rid of my ear finger at my little nut because it shows that it happens like I feel like if I took the nub off you would have a little bit of a scar and I have just a really abnormally long nail so I don’t know. It’s a cool story I don’t know so 

42:15 - NAIL SALON

I teach also so I like having my nails done during the school year because you have your hand under the dock you Camelot so I went to the nail salon and I was kind of anxious I was like well I don’t even know how they’re gonna deal with this. The woman looked at my nail she was like, oh what happened and I’m like I got bit by Neil and she’s like oh wait and you just *choking noises* like I don’t know if this freaks out you know and then when you get a gel manicure I don’t know if you know this ‘cause you're dude but they go in with clippers and little wedges and like deal with your cuticle and stuff and like clip your cuticle and I was like please don’t touch my eel finger like I was so freaked out– was still pretty fresh, like a few months later. Please don’t touch it like I was really really scared about it.

Now I get my nails and I’m like nah, don’t worry I’ll just hold it up for you and I hold up the little flap and they paint under it. But also I go to the same nail person now so they know it. When I show up it’s, Oh, ‘Eelise’! And I’m like yeah, what up?

43:40 - NOT CHANGED

Jeremy: At the end of our conversation, I asked Elise if her experience had changed her and the way she thinks about the ocean or moray eels.

Elise: Honestly, it was gnarly but it hasn’t changed any of my feelings. Will I dive for scallops again? Yeah, absolutely! Have I since? Yeah! I do remember like the first time I went diving after this whole thing, I wasn’t scared. I’ve definitely become more aware of eels, like if I’m diving when I dive for scallops or I just snorkel around I feel like I see them more. But I’m not scared of them. I still eat them in sushi! That’s just a really, really cool story that I can share now– that’s kind of why I don’t wanna get the whole eel finger cut off or like done surgery on. It’s cool and it’s not doing anything negative, it’s just a cool part of me.

44:41 - OUTRO

Jeremy: Elise is now spending most of her time sharing her love of the natural world as a science teacher, but still shows up on the island on a regular basis because like her deformed eel finger, the island is just part of her now.

The Teeth podcast music is by Davey Chegwidden and Joshua Lopez. Special thanks to my sister, Alicia for her help editing this episode, which was co-produced by Scot Nery and myself, Jeremy Carberry. 

Will you do me a favor and reach out and let me know what you are liking and what you want more or less of from the show? We are still in our baby stages and can use any encouragement and/or constructive feedback you have. It really makes a huge difference. I really hope you find some time to get outside today and observe some of the wildlife, while simultaneously keeping a safe and respectful distance we don’t need any more new guests. We have plenty of stories already lined up, please don’t invent a scenario where you get attacked and want to be on the show.