As tired light filtered through the fog on a recent Monday morning, Daniel Valenzuela sloshed shin-deep into a flooded rice paddy in Southeast Texas. He shoved a scoop-shaped sled along the ground in front of him, snagging wire traps from the water as he walked.
Valenzuela thrashed each trap against the water a few times, then inverted them over his vessel. Crawfish tumbled in. They raised candy-red claws and scuttled at one another, a bright shock against the grayscale sky.
This is the wet, dirty work that brings crawfish to cayenne-laced boils all over Houston. During peak season from March and May, Valenzuela and eight coworkers at Bayou Best Crawfish cross 900 acres of paddies each morning, raking in up to 12,000 pounds of mudbugs in a single day.
THIS YEAR’S HAUL:Crawfish is returning to Houston restaurants. What kind of season do experts expect in 2026?…