Do you say "crawdad" or "crayfish"?
crawdad.
I love the old cajun story of the genesis of the mudbug.
It seems that way back in the day, when the 'cajuns' were the 'acadians' and lived up in south eastern canada/northeastern US they were, naturally lobser men, as those that remain still often are.
Well when the time came for them to migrate down to points south they did and before too long those big ol' maine lobster started to get lonely for their old friends and decided to follow.
But it's a long arduous trip from Nova Scotia to NOLA. particularly when your only mode of transport are eight tiny legs. well after a goodly long while they did finally make it but their adventures had caused them to lose a lot of weight. Thus mudbugs.