<p>Eddie Stuckey, a die-hard eastern diamondback rattlesnake hunter, enjoys spending time in the woods with his friends and relatives while searching for North Americas largest venomous reptile.</p><p>He and his fellow Grady County hunters showed up Saturday with 83 of the 320 diamondbacks turned in at the 44th annual Whigham Rattlesnake Roundup, a major community fund-raising event for the southwestern Georgia town of 602.</p><p>Its just fun, Stuckey said. Its a male bonding thing. The women are at home.</p><p>Hunters brought their snakes in boxes to a fenced snake ring. Then under the gaze of thousands of spectators, contest officials removed them from the boxes with crooked metal rods, weighed the largest snakes and dropped them all into eight Plexiglas containers, where the snakes rattled and often bared their fangs.</p><p>I dont want to get too close to them, said Martha Carter, 59, of Cairo. I imagine theyre like humans _ if you bother them, they might bother you.</p><p>Snake hunter LaRue Sheffield, 42, of Douglas, lifted some of the larger rattlers out of their boxes and walked around the ring showing them to the spectators. Some of the visitors shrieked and jerked away from the fence. Diamondbacks can grow to at least six feet long.</p><p>Berl Hawthorne of Whigham won the prize for the heaviest snake at 7.3 pounds and Tommy Lancos, also of Whigham, was awarded a prize for having the most snakes, 102. Organizers said they expected the attendance to soar above 25,000, thousands more than last year.</p><p>Animal-rights activists have called for an end to Georgias two rattlesnake roundups in Whigham and Claxton, near Savannah. They say the events demonize snakes, endanger other wildlife that share their burrows and contribute to the decline of eastern diamondbacks.</p><p>But Barry Strickland, ringmaster for the Whigham show, said organizers have not seen any discernible decline in southwestern Georgia and consider the roundup educational.</p><p>Snakes are not shown in any disrespectful way, he said. What weve always told people is that this is a wild creature thats dangerous and if you meet them in the wild, get away from them. We have never sensationalized snakes.</p><p>Strickland also noted that organizers discourage the use of gasoline fumes to roust snakes from gopher tortoise burrows. Diamondbacks share the burrows with more than 300 other species, some of them endangered.</p><p>Activists say the fumes can be lethal to some of the burrow denizens.</p><p>Randy Campbell, a Cookville, Tenn., snake dealer, buys the Whigham snakes. Some are sold to zoos and collectors and others, for their meat and hides, he said.</p><p>The rattlesnake population is well, he said. Youve got a handful of people complaining about roundups. None of them live in areas where they would ever have to worry about their families getting bitten.</p><p>The booth selling deep-fried rattlesnake meat was missing this year, but for adventurous souls yearning for a wild dining experience, there was alligator kabobs.</p><p>Wildlife biologist Chet Powell of Adel gave demonstrations with captive snakes _ a first for the show.</p><p>He had all the U.S. venomous snakes, including canebrake rattlers and coral snakes, and several exotic species, such as a 10-foot Burmese python. People reached out to touch the python as it coiled around two of Powells assistants.</p><p>Powell is trying to convince organizers that they can have a successful festival without taking rattlers from the wild.</p><p>Were making our point that we hope things will change, he said.</p>
