Posted on 03/30/2009 11:37:50 AM PDT by Free ThinkerNY
MARATHON, Florida (CNN) -- Juan Lopez reads meters with one eye and looks for snakes with the other. Lopez is a member of the "Python Patrol," a team of utility workers, wildlife officials, park rangers and police trying to keep Burmese pythons from gaining a foothold in the Florida Keys.
Officials say the pythons -- which can grow to 20 feet long and eat large animals whole -- are being ditched by pet owners in the Florida Everglades, threatening the region's endangered species and its ecosystem.
"Right now, we have our fingers crossed that they haven't come this far yet, but if they do, we are prepared," Lopez said.
Burmese Pythons are rarely seen in the middle Florida Keys, where Lopez works. The Nature Conservancy wants to keep it that way.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...
They are just eating the critters the locals won’t eat.
Yes, but can we eat python?
Does it taste like chicken?
Maybe they could get all the pythons to eat the iguanas all over the place now. Then bring in some hybrid apes to eat the pythons. That’ll do the trick!
Bounty
$50.00 per dead snake.
I wish they would eat some of the local iguanas.
then sell hybrid ape ear tags
Yes
Does it taste like chicken?
Yes, but lotsa bones.
They also make good boots, belts and purses...
Florida speed bump.
I have enough trouble with people dumping cats and dogs at my gate.
Put a $10,000 tax on all imports of exotic,i.e. non-native species, with a $1,000,000 fine if tax not paid.Make it a federal felony to have non-native species outside of a licensed zoo.
And full exemption from any prosecution or lawsuit for anyone who destroys non-native species that have been released or escaped from any facility or home.
I DESPISE dealers in exotic,non-native animals.
I'd cheer if PETA,et al, campaigned to shut them all down.
Eeeewwwww.....
Pythons?
It’s the legendary Black Beast of Aaauugh!
Run away! Run away!
Free green card for every 200 dead snakes you provide!
School chief's wife is targeted in Florida Keys probe can they eat the indigenous inbred thieving conchs???
A school district scandal is brewing in the Florida Keys, with the main focus an unlikely person: the superintendent's wife.
Allegations also have arisen that Acevedo squandered a $250,000 federal grant for a 2006 Even Start program to help poor families, pocketed more than $28,000 in cash fees from adult cosmetology classes, and absconded with money from three fundraisers by the Key West freshman class she sponsors.
Some questioned Acevedo's purchases. One was Judy Walterson, who in an e-mail dated Nov. 11, 2007, asked for an explanation of the purchase of Red Bull and Mountain Dew for the MARC House, a home for developmentally challenged adults.
Now she'll have to explain the purchase of several men's suits, all size 54L. Her husband recently weighed in at 317 pounds in a ''Biggest Loser'' contest with the mayor of Key West and two others.
.
Lucky for Florida that Sarah Palin isn’t their governor. Then, we’d get stern lectures on the cruelty involved in killing those poor snakes. Gotta love Dim hypocracy. :-)
Every exotic pet owner I have ever known was a shameless attention whore.
What is a "hybrid ape?"
Unfortunately its probably to late for those measures with critters that already have a foothold such as the python etc.
Kinda like our president - only smarter.
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