MARRAKESH, Morocco (AFP) - The men work in Marrakesh Djemma el Fna Square, the charm snakes and tourists, but their magic is not for the work with the animals rights activists insist that the practice banned as cruel.
Long one of the main attractions of the city, the charmers say they take care of their snakes "as their children".
But a French animal rights group urges tourists to boycott the snake charmers, they say, the mistreatment reptiles.
The Study and Observation Group to Protect Wild Animals (GEOS) encourages visitors to "avoid the spectacle indecent that mistreat animals or even better to express your outrage" to the authorities.
The boycott appeal received 200 signatures in the first few days after its launch, after its initiator Michel Aymerich.
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The 49-year-old Moroccan-born French political admits he is a fan of "Nature most unloved" snakes, scorpions and spiders.
"They need to know that the snakes are deaf and react only to gestures. Cobras rise to the flute is not because of the music, but because they feel threatened and instinctively a defensive position, and give up the spectacular display of the Hood," Aymerich.
"In addition, for the most part they remove their teeth or poisonous glands, which causes abscesses, and a slow and painful death."
Defanged or not, Aymerich says the snakes are under terrible stress and die after several weeks of performance. Their normal life span would have been 12 to 15 years.
"These people are totally ignorant of our profession," the doyen of the Marrakech snake charmers, 80-year-old Lhoussine Hajjaj told AFP.
"These reptiles are like our children. We care about their education, nutrition and health, because it is our money."
The snakes are fed eggs, birds and even sheep heart.
"As one of the snakes is tired, we ask a veterinarian, medication to prescribe," he said.
He denied as "false rumours" that the charmers remove the teeth and the snake venom glands.
"If that is true, why is it that victims among us?"
Hajjaj also alleged that the disputed cobras died after only a few months.
"This is wrong, because there is a cobra, was on the Djemma el Fna, the more than 10 years," he said.
Most of the snakes come from Morocco Guelmim of the southern region, according to Aymerich, caught by members of the Brotherhood Aissaoua religious community, which supplies many protected animals in the market at Marrakesh.
Aymerich want the region into a nature park, with the Aissaoua always guide for the tourists.
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