Rattlesnake Roundup

Sweetwater Texas

March 15, 2009

After the Abilene ZAT, we drove to Sweetwater for the 51^st annual Rattlesnake Roundup.

I was one of the few lucky guys to get a picture with Miss Snake Charmer 2009!

If you go to Sweetwater, sooner or later, you are going to run into a Brown family member.

And we did….Teresa’s cousin Donna Beth.

At one booth, the kids shot blow darts at a target. Grant got one bulls-eye, but they might have done better if they opened their eyes!

The Marine Corp was giving prizes if you could do 8 chin ups. I could only do 7 :(

Teresa and Grant play with the rattlesnakes. You are probably wondering why there are no pictures of Georgia with the snakes. She wouldn’t go within 50 yards of one!

Grant and I headed over to the “skinning pit.” This is where they separated the skin from the meat.

Grant said he wanted to skin a snake. So the man grabbed Grant with his big bloody hand and together they ripped open the snake!!

Grant was holding the still beating heart of the snake in his right hand!

I think he handled it well!

Grant handled it like an experienced country boy. Click HERE to see him in action!

We got to keep the rattlesnake skin, so we took it back to the hotel and we scrapped all the fat off the pelt with a spoon.

We coated it with a tanning solution and let it dry in the sun.

Now that the snake was good and dead, Georgia joined in!

The final product!!