Corpus Christi Caller Times Caller.com - Cool temperatures slow rattlers in Old San Pat

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Sunday, March 18, 2001
Cool temperatures slow rattlers in Old San Pat
Spectators get a close-up look at the reptiles and can find out if they really do taste like chicken
By Jason Ma
Caller-Times

George Tuley/Caller-Times

Lubbock resident Kristen Knight (left) gingerly touches the tail of a live rattlesnake at the 29th Annual World Championship Rattlesnake Races at the Old San Patricio Fairgrounds.

The sound of what seemed like countless little splashes in a fountain spilled out from the Old San Patricio Fairgrounds Saturday. But that sound was actually 100 nervous rattlesnakes in a pit.
   With clouds and temperatures Saturday in the 50s and 60s, the cold-blooded reptiles were relatively lethargic for the several hundred people who came to see them at the 29th Annual World Championship Rattlesnake Races near San Patricio.
   Bob Herndon, one of the founders of the Rattlesnake Race, said the snakes were slower than in other years. But the clouds broke briefly at one point and the snakes picked up the pace.
   One of the fastest snakes of the day covered 80 feet in about 2.5 minutes
   "You put the snake down, and which ever way he wants to go, he goes," Herndon said. Handlers helped prod the snakes in the race to keep them in their lane and out of the crowd.
   Snake handler Buddy Campbell stood in the middle of the snake pit. With boots on his feet and about 30 years of snake handling behind him, he was unfazed by all the coils of western diamondback rattlesnakes.
   "It's like skydiving, the thrill of it," he said. "You never know when one's going to bite you."
   A snake has bitten him once, six years ago, and he said he almost died. That was because he was allergic to the anti-venom.
   Despite his near-death experience, he said he hasn't been afraid of snakes since he was kid growing up on a ranch near Fort Worth.
   "They think I'm nuts," Campbell said of the people who know about his hobby.
   Jamie Nott, a student pilot at Naval Air Station Corpus Christi, was more amazed at Campbell's calm around the snakes than at the snakes themselves.
   "This is incredible," Nott said. "I find it completely amazing that this guy is totally at ease, standing among all these snakes."
   In the snake pit, the snakes hardly moved. Handlers picked them up and held up their rattler ends to curious crowds. The experience helped change David Flores of Corpus Christi's perceptions.
   "They seem rather docile," he said. "We seem to be the aggressors."
   The snake debate continued to divide people at the otherwise festive races: does snake meat really taste like chicken or not? Visitors had a chance to try what was billed as "Texas caviar" at a booth that served snake meat in the form of chicken fried snake, as Herndon called it.
   Vicki Saldana of Austin said snake had a definite poultry flavor.
   "I thought it was kind of like chicken," she said. "Or maybe some other type of fowl. Quail?"
   Flores disagreed, saying the meat had a different, tangier flavor.
   "It had a unique flavor," he said.
   Richard Saenz Jr., a rancher from Benavides, takes snakes from his ranch and eats them regularly.
   "It's good eating, like fried chicken," Saenz said.
   The Rattlesnake Races continue today at the Old San Patricio Fairgrounds, from 10 a.m. until dark.

Staff writer Jason Ma can be reached at _886-3778 or by e-mail at maj@caller.com

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