A few years ago I had just returned to the United States after a couple of years of traveling that I had saved up for. I needed a new job when I returned to the States but the economy was not doing all that great. One sector that was doing fairly well was the oil and gas industry.

In Houston I found an ad in the local paper for the job of "mudlogger". I had no idea in the world what a mudlogger did but the job description indicated that it had something to do with geology.

I had taken several hours of geology courses in college and had some prior experience in the oilfield. I still had in interest in geology and after reading the classified advertisement gave the mudlogging company a call.

I actually got the owner on the other end of the phone and he explained that his company, I'll call it "Joe's Mudlogging Company" provided an important service to oil companies as they were drilling an oil or gas well. He explained the process in great detail.

Their employees would set up in a mobile lab or "unit" and run small plastic hoses to a tank called the "possum belly" where the drilling mud came out of the ground. An agitator stirred up gas from the drilling mud, which traveled through the small hoses to a machine called a chromatograph inside the mobile lab which was used to monitor the returned drilling fluid for natural gas traces.

A large gas reading on the equipment they monitored could mean the oil company had drilled into a productive zone. These "shows" along with other information such as rock type were recorded on a log, which is sort of an underground map that is drawn as the drill bit progresses down through the earth.

In addition, the job consisted of catching samples of the drilling mud and washing out the rock that was contained in it for analysis.

After washing the rock samples the mudlogger inspects these under both a microscope and a fluoroscope for traces of oil. Oil laden samples would give off a dull yellow glow under the UV light.

The owner indicated that he usually hired geologists but given my background and previous technical experience in the electronics industry I would be a good candidate.

I went in for the interview and was hired on the spot. I was given a voucher for some steel toe boots and handed a shiny new hardhat. I went home and told my wife who was very excited. I didn't expect to be working that weekend but an hour later my phone rang. "We need you on a job in south Louisiana tomorrow morning at 6:00 AM" said the dispatcher.

After writing down the directions to the job site I got my clothes together in an old duffel bag, and hit the road driving toward Louisiana. Finally, after driving down miles of mossy tree lined roads surrounded by swamp I found the dock where a work boat was supposed to pick me up and take me to the drilling rig out on a barge in the middle of a lake.

I climbed aboard the work boat and in about an hour we bumped up against the floating oil drilling platform. I signed in with the rig boss or toolpusher, who showed me the barge's safety gear and told me about how fire drills were sometimes conducted and where to meet when the alarm went off.

"If da rig is on fire we meet ova dere," the large Cajun man said, as he motioned to the rear of the large barge. For a second I thought I'd just jump in the swamp if that ever happened. Outside the window I watched as an alligator swam lazily past the rig in the swamp down below. As he filled me in and I considered my chances with either option. Neither was good.

Next I checked in with the "company man" or oil company's consultant on location. He was a gruff, mean looking Cajun fellow and didn't smile. He curtly directed me to the mudlogging "shack" or portable office up on the deck of the drilling rig floor. Inside I found a skinny, deranged looking man who looked like he had not bathed in weeks. He informed me that he had just quit and that I was going to take his place.

Of course I had no experience in mudlogging and knew little about what I was supposed to do. The man said "here, you take this sample tray and collect a sample every ten feet, then you look at it and write on the log if it is sand or shale, and if it is fluorescent". He was due to leave when the work boat cast off in a few minutes and in that short time he filled my head full of a million bits of information, of which I understood about one percent.

As I watched the work boat sputter away across the swamp I wondered what I had gotten into. To make a long story short, I learned a lot about mudlogging in a matter of a few hours and I did a lot of things wrong. I learned the hard way that when the company man (drilling company representative) asks you a question you better have the right answer.

In between collecting muddy samples of drill bit cuttings and typing the results into the computer I was able to talk to my supervisor via cell phone and he helped me fake it for about twelve hours until another experienced logger arrived on location.

I managed to become a fairly decent mudlogger in a few months and worked for a couple more years until burnout finally hit me. One of the most difficult things about the business is the lack of respect for the profession in the oil industry. The mudlogger truly is at the bottom end of the food chain on an oil rig. This is due in large part to the fact that their work is seen as non - essential to the drilling of the well by the rest of the rig crew. The fact is however, that mudloggers can play a vital role in areas where underground pressure is unpredictable.

Mudloggers have helped prevent many disastrous oilfield blowouts by warning of pockets of gas that can blow out to the surface and cause a fire.

I met a few real "characters" in the time I spent in the business. The fact that mudloggers often stay on the job for weeks on end without relief means that it takes a certain type of individual, not entirely normal, to live such a live. I mean no disrespect to those in the mudlogging business by saying that but it is true.

My experience was not all bad and the job served my needs for that particular time in my life.

Also, the pay was fairly good, starting at $200 per day plus expenses and increasing to $250 plus $40 per day expenses after six months. I made approximately $70,000 in my first year.

It's not the perfect job for everybody, but many find mudlogging a good career choice. Unfortunately it wasn't a good long term one for me.

For More about what a mudloger does see: How To Get A Job As A Mudlogger