Before I get into the Roundup, I want to thank everyone who helped out. Without your help, this would have been a truly daunting task.
Special thanks for contributions from: UnBOAlievable, Trowalkari, Ponderosa, Wrasse, SteveP, Haraldo359, NicholeRussell, Herm & Schatzie, RevMojo, Sebcambon, Xzylum, Morti & Ldydrgn, BeeJay, SavannahBabe & Faze, Toker, DavidBeard, Brian Adamchuck, Holly Stone, Ron Davis, and Shannon Bassett. I hope I didnt forget anyone.
Also thanks to
Natas and everyone else at RTB that helped spread the word gave so much support.
And a big thank you to
Precision Caging for donating caging!
OK, onto the Roundup. The final total of snakes brought in this year was 348. We were able to save
28! Given the box full of dead ones, I figure that about
10% were saved! That is not bad. We got 12 baby Eastern Diamondbacks, 12 Easterns between 2'-4', one LARGE adult female, 1 yearling Canebrake Rattlesnake, and 2 adult Canebrake Rattlesnakes. We got just about every single one he would let go. It took some work to even ONE of the adults.
THis event was larger than I could have possibly imagined! One of the coordinators gave me an estimate of
20,000 people!!!!!! At $5 a head, that adds up quickly. Not to mention over 100 vendor booths.
When I took this, we were not even withing sight of the roundup!
It was a sea of cars! The pictures do not do it justice. I had to take 3 or 4 pictures just to get them all in! Here is one of them.
And a sea of people. This was toward the end of the day and only showing a small portion of the grounds! i could not have imagined what we were up against.
The Rattlesnake Pavilion from the backside
And plenty of Roundup gear. This guy was nice enough to hold up the Children's shirt
Of course, the Rattlesnakes are not the ONLY draw
A couple of the snake pens
After glad handing for a while, we talked out way into the holding area for better pics.
And of course, they were milking snakes for the croud (they said the venom was for research
) This shot was taken right before this guy turned around and almost stabbed me in the head with a 5' Diamondback!!!!!!!!
And of course, they had all the Roundup Queens. Gee, how about you get them WAY too close and NOT look at the sankes freaking head!!!!
I think UnBOAlievable was having about as much fun as me!
And of course, there were several booths selling snake items.
And of the saddest things. This kid's mom let me take his picture. A new generation is well on its way
There are a few more images in my gallery.
Roundup2004Album
But the transaction went very smoothly. The snakes ran from $20-$50 depending on size. But I truly think that we got ALL that he would allow us. 10% is not bad for a weekend. Now comes the hard part, getting them healthy and feeding. Pics of the individuals will come soon, but for now, here is one of the little guys.
Time to relax for a few minutes.
)
