The record-setting python discovered in Florida was a gigantic 18 feet long and weighed a staggering 200 pounds

The Burmese python is a species that is considered to be invasive.

 

According to National Geographic, researchers were able to coax the largest Burmese python ever observed in Florida out of its hidden location in the Everglades by using another python as bait. This discovery was made possible by the efforts of the researchers.

 

The monstrous female python measured about 18 feet (5.4 meters) in length and weighed 215 pounds (97 kilograms), which was 30 pounds (13.6 kg) more than the next-largest python that has ever been discovered in the state, according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, most Burmese pythons (Python bivittatus) found in Florida range in length from 6 to 10 feet (1.8 to 3 m). However, in their native habitats in Southeast Asia, the snakes commonly reach 18 feet (5.4 m), and the largest can reach lengths of 20 feet (6 m) or more.

 

Since being brought to Florida in the 1970s, invasive pythons have been able to breed effectively in the southern parts of the state. There, they are known to prey on various native birds and mammals and the rare alligator or domestic dog.

 

The extensive marshlands, woodlands, and subtropical forests of the Everglades and the surrounding areas make it very difficult to notice Burmese pythons, even though they are larger than most of the native snake species found in Florida. According to National Geographic, python trackers at the Conservancy of Southwest Florida, a Naples-based organization, implant GPS trackers inside male pythons and then send these "scout snakes" slithering into the wild to reduce these invasive populations by drawing reproductively active females out of hiding. The goal is to reduce these populations by drawing reproductively active females out of hiding.

 

Sarah Funck, a biologist with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, spoke with National Geographic: "Large reproductive female pythons are very important to remove from these ecosystems." This is because large reproductive female pythons are disproportionately capable of producing many offspring.

 

The team collected the record-setting female scout snake in December of 2021, and they used a 3.7-meter-long scout snake by the name of Dionysus, also known as Dion, as bait for the catch. Dion was 12 feet long.

 

During that period, the group saw that Dion had established himself in a specific place close to Naples, within the habitat of the western Everglades. After an intense wrestling struggle, the researchers captured the enormous female into a bag, which they then put in a tub and carried to their research center. When they checked on their scout snake, they found him coiled beside a monster female. (Dion, conversely, made it through the confrontation unscathed and resumed his search for the conservancy.)

 

Following the adult female snake's euthanization, the group performed an autopsy on the corpulent python. They discovered a record number of "follicles" inside its body. Follicles are essentially spherical structures that develop into eggs after they are fertilized. Evidence suggesting the python's most recent meal was an adult white-tailed deer found in the snake's digestive tract. The fragments of fur, clumps of disintegrated bone, and a portion of a hoof were all detected in the snake.

 

According to National Geographic, based on the results of previous necropsies that were conducted similarly, researchers have determined that Burmese pythons in the state of Florida feed on an estimated 24 species of mammals and 47 species of birds. Two species of reptiles.

 

"These pythons can alter the ecosystem, and I would say they probably already have," Kristen Hart, an ecologist with the U.S. Geological Survey Wetland and Aquatic Research Center and a collaborator with the conservancy team, told National Geographic.

Article source : https://www.livescience.com/largest-python-in-florida-found

Image source  : https://pixabay.com/id/photos/kulit-ular-reptil-kulit-ular-satwa-2857775/

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