Free Republic

Ticks on a snake:

For the first time, scientists have put numbers to the toll Burmese pythons have had on native wildlife in the Everglades. But one word can sum it up: carnage. In the decade since the giant constrictors started showing up in significant numbers, mammals once among the most common in Everglades National Park have declined dramatically, according to a study published online Monday in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.The study, based on night field surveys conducted over 10 years, found three animals had all but disappeared. Opossum sightings fell 98.9 percent. Raccoons — once so abundant park managers warned...

An encounter between a snake and a baby ended in a surprising outcome Thursday, when the infant's mother walked into his room to find him chewing on the dead reptile. The infant, Imad Gadir, whose family resides in Shfaram, was not hurt when he bit the unlucky coin snake, but was taken to Haifa's Ramabam Medical Center, just in case. According to Imad's grandfather, Shaheen Shaheen, who recalled the family's tumultuous morning, the boy woke up when his father left for work at 6:30 am. The 1-year-old left his parents' bed and headed to his room, where he found the...

Pelosi plans to reveal information about Gingrich 'when the time is right' By Alicia M. Cohn - 12/05/11 11:44 AM ET House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is holding back some information on Republican Newt Gingrich that could detract from his presidential campaign, according to a report published Monday. “One of these days we’ll have a conversation about Newt Gingrich,” Pelosi told Talking Points Memo. “When the time is right. … I know a lot about him. I served on the investigative committee that investigated him, four of us locked in a room in an undisclosed location for a year....

UPDATE: Thursday 11/17 @ 6:55 p.m. MORGANTOWN, W.Va. (WSAZ) -- A young woman has already undergone four surgeries and is still in intensive care after suffering not one, but two copperhead snake bites. Tara Williams, 21, of Logan was on a hunting trip with her boyfriend three weeks ago in Ritchie County when she stepped on a large copperhead snake. Click here to find out more! Tara's mom tells WSAZ.com, the snake snapped at her and bit her twice and her boyfriend drove her to the hospital. "Right now, mentally, she's having a hard time with this," said Tara's mother...

A gigantic python snake in Florida ate a 76-pound adult deer. The 16 foot long Burmese python was one of the largest pythons discovered to date in the sunshine state. According to Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission’s exotic species coordinator Scott Hardin, if these huge snakes aren’t killed, they could migrate northward. A government sanctioned shotgun blast stopped this snake from its potential journey to Atlanta or the Carolinas. And just how any inches around did the beast’s belly have to measure in order to covert a 76 pound Bambi into breakfast? 44 inches. Oh, and what is the average...

Mitt Romney, under fire from all sides on the strength of his political convictions, said Thursday he has been as consistent as a person can be during his political career. "I've been as consistent as human beings can be," the presidential candidate said in a meeting with the editorial board of New Hampshire's Seacoast Media Group. "I cannot state every single issue in exactly the same words every single time, and so there are some folks who, obviously, for various political and campaign purposes will try and find some change and try to draw great attention to something which looks...

Truth is, James Carville still thinks Hillary Clinton should be president. But just out of curiousity, what does Bill Clinton's former chief political strategist think of the developing Republican field for 2012? Our pal Scott Hennen, one of the country's top conservative radio talkers, asked Carville just that. And the pair had a, uh, candid exchange: HENNEN: Obviously Herman Cain’s faring pretty well right now in the polls, and all along, quite honestly, had the most passionate supporters in this field; a nonpolitician, which has probably served him well, just as an example of the frustration of the conservative Republican...

CANTON, Ga. -- State wildlife officials are investigating after 10 snakes and three lizards were found in a car during a traffic stop on Interstate 75 north of Atlanta. Authorities say Cherokee County sheriff's deputies pulled the car over on Interstate 75 Monday. Georgia Department of Natural Resources spokeswoman Melissa Cummings told WSB-TV that an Indiana driver had 10 snakes and three different lizard species in the car. Cummings said the snakes were not venomous. She said species included corn, coachwhip, pine, king and Southern hognose snakes - all native to Georgia - plus a rosy boa, a non-native snake....

light brown/grey snake, no obviously pointed head, skinny about 10-12 inches long, looks like a baby how can i identify this quickly before I figure out what to do with it.

So I just killed a Copperhead Snake in my front yard. I'm still shaking and it's still writhing. Thing is there were two, one in line behind the other. When I came back with the shovel, the "first" one in line had "disappeared". Where do you think it went and what do I do about it? (Please keep it relatively clean) I HATE snakes!

A few days ago, I received an email from a friend entitled “Interesting Marriages,” containing four links. The first link told the 2007 story of a Sudanese man who was caught copulating with a goat. Since the Sudanese tribal custom requires that a man must marry a woman whom he sexually violated (in order to preserve her family’s honor), the village leaders decided to publicly embarrass the man who had violated the goat, forcing him to pay a dowry to the goat’s owner before “marrying” the goat. The story, which was first reported in a light-hearted way on the website...

FOSTER -- But some parents in Boone County are outraged after finding out there have been three real snakes found loose in Brookview Elementary in just two weeks time. Boone County Schools Assistant Superintendent Jeff Huffman says the snakes appear to be garden snakes, also known as garter snakes. Grandmother Nancy Dickens says the whole situation is a little shocking. "I would go find someone to help me get it out of there," Dickens said. "I would try to keep the kids away from it." Huffman says an exterminator has been called to the school on two different occasions this...

A jilted ex-lover in Stillwater is accused of going to his former flame's home, where he killed her pet snake and wrote "I loved you" with its blood. When police arrived at the ex-girlfriend's home, Jonathan Paul Utecht, 21, was standing outside with blood on his hands and told the woman, who was with the officers, "that she did not want to go inside the apartment and see what he had done," according to a criminal complaint. Utecht was charged today with felony counts of burglary and terroristic threats. His initial court appearance will be July 28. Police were alerted...

A snake with two heads, each able to think and eat separately and even steal food from each other, has become a popular attraction at a Ukrainian zoo. The small albino California Kingsnake, now on show in the Black Sea resort of Yalta is quite a handful, zoo workers told AFP. The snake's two heads are fiercely independent, are not always in agreement and like to snatch food from each other, said keepers of the private zoo, called Skazka, or Fairy Tale. "Sometimes one head wants to crawl in one direction and the other head in another direction," zoo director...

The man who made famous the words, “It’s the economy stupid,” in 1992, James Carville came out yesterday that for President Barack Obama, 2012 could very well become a very rough year, and not just also for the reasons of the upcoming United States Presidential election but for reasons of possible civil unrest because of a very weak economy. From the Daily Caller:”That expression made its way into the campaign in 2008, and according to Carville, it could be the theme of the 2012 campaign as well as President Barack Obama seeks reelection. In an appearance on Monday’s “Imus in...

Does anyone know the species? He's sitting across the road from our driveway and my wife is terrified of him. Yeah, that's the ticket, he scares my wife. He's HUGH and SERIES, almost three feet long!

"Today was a fun day," Obama said at his first fundraising event at Corzine's apartment.

Snakes alive! - the cobra has been found. The Bronx Zoo's escaped snake was snared in the House of Reptiles on Thursday, six days after she slithered out of her enclosure. "We found our snake and we're very happy," Jim Breheny, the zoo's director, told the Daily News. The fanged fugitive was spotted coiled in a corner around 9 a.m., during one of three daily sweeps by a half-dozen zoo workers. Using special tongs and hooks, they easily apprehended the deadly Egyptian cobra, which is now under observation. "We knew it was going to be a game of patience. We...

Seen coiled around a branch in an undated picture, a new species of snake called the ruby-eyed green pit viper (Cryptelytrops rubeus) has been discovered in Southeast Asia, according to a recent study. The snake lives in forests near Ho Chi Minh City and across the low hills of southern Vietnam and eastern Cambodia's Langbian Plateau. Scientists collected green pit vipers from Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, and Cambodia between 1999 and 2003 and examined them in the lab, using physical characteristics and genetics to identify new species. "We know this species from only a few specimens, and very few people in...

Charlie Sheen and Lady Gaga have some new competition on Twitter. On Monday, a 20-in. Egyptian cobra escaped from the Bronx Zoo in New York City. The creature–or someone close to it, since snakes can’t type–launched a twitter account under the name BronxZoosCobra. The account had more than 80,000 followers as of 6 p.m. today. The followers included Meghan McCain and Rachel Maddow. Some of the snake’s musings so far: –According to the rules of Twitter, I think I’m supposed to announce a multi-city comedy tour now. Right @ConanOBrien & @CharlieSheen? –On top of the Empire State Building! All the...

NEW YORK, N.M.- The Reptile House at New York's Bronx Zoo remained closed Sunday as staff searched for a deadly Egyptian cobra, the zoo said. The zoo told CBS New York the building was closed as soon as the venomous snake was discovered missing from its enclosure, which was not open to visitors Saturday afternoon. Zookeepers said they believed the 20-inch-long snake was somewhere in the building. "We are informing the public out of an abundance of caution, and will continue to take whatever steps necessary to ensure public safety," the zoo said. The species is native to Africa and...

When the Cottonmouth Mocassins come out you know it's really Spring!

A snake who bit Israeli model and actress Orit Fox in the chest died after being poisoned by an unusual venom -- the silicone in the buxom blonde's surgically enhanced breasts. The video shows the model fondling and licking the serpent for a feature...before the snake got fresh with Fox and latched on to her bountiful left breast. Fox was taken to Hillel Yaffe Hospital in Hadera, northwest of Jerusalem. After a tetanus shot and a few hours of observation, she was released... But the snake did not fare so well. Days later...the creature had died of silicone poisoning.

Video Link Here

A Boston woman has her boa constrictor back, a month after the reptile slipped off her neck on a subway. Melissa Moorhouse, 30, told The Boston Globe she first noticed Penelope, her nearly 3-foot-long, non-venomous Dumeril's boa, missing as she headed outbound on the Red Line train Jan. 6. Transit employees helped her look in the subway car, held the train for a few minutes and searched further at the Braintree terminus without success. Thursday morning, a Red Line passenger spotted a snake and told a motorman, transit police Lt. Daniel Fitzgerald said. The train was taken out of service,...

Two Wisconsin men, one of them a twice-convicted sex offender, have denied in court that they used a live snake to rape a woman in a home in Eau Claire. John Bullock, 24, of Altoona, and Damonta Jones, 25, of Eau Claire, pleaded not guilty Monday in Eau Claire County Circuit Court to first-degree sexual assault of the 32-year-old woman. Both men remain jailed in lieu of $30,000 bail.

Politics: The Senate Majority Leader has a plan to deal with Republican electoral success. When you lose the game, you simply change the rules. When you only have 53 votes, you lower the bar to 51. When Harry Reid was hawking his book "The Good Fight" on C-Span's "Book Notes" in 2008, he described how he had vehemently opposed GOP plans for the "nuclear option," changing the rules to break a Democratic filibuster on President George W. Bush's judicial nominees. Only 51 votes would be needed to move them along. "What the Republicans came up with was a way to...

I suspect that not many people can claim that they get a Christmas card from a snake every year. I never would have thought it would happen either. It began with a phone call one Christmas Eve morning. Because of the nature of my veterinary practice, a call from a frantic snake owner was not uncommon. You see, my hospital in Southern California specialized in “non-traditional” pets, the kind that slither, creep, fly, scratch, hoot, burrow or any combination thereof. So, when the caller claimed that her snake could not crawl normally it did not strike me as odd. The...

It's the latest story heard 'round the world, and at first people thought it was a hoax. A man living near Slidell sent around an e-mail and posted a story on Facebook, claiming that a 5-foot-long snake hid in his front-door holiday wreath and bit him when he stepped too close. Marc Jones and his wife, Jill, have heard from countless friends and strangers since the incident occurred, from Texas, Georgia and all the way to South Korea. The bite occurred in October, but the buzz has continued. Could it be true?

A Darwin school student received an unexpected shock yesterday when they opened their schoolbag to retrieve their lunch only to discover a snake slithering inside. The student's quick-thinking teacher zipped up the bag and called in snake catcher Chris Peberdy to retrieve the reptile. "I got a call from a concerned school in the Darwin area that one of the students had opened their school bag and much to their surprise realised they had brought with them more than lunch," he said. "A snake had crawled in there, possibly the night before, and only showed itself in class. "The teacher...

HUNTERS AND FARMERS AND THOSE WHO LIVE IN THE COUNTRY.....TAKE HEED.... My fellow friends and family, We have killed 57 rattlesnakes on two separate ranches this year. 24 @South bend & 33 @ Murray, since mid May. Not one has buzzed! We provoked one fair sized boy with a stick and he coiled & struck at the stick a couple of times before he buzzed up and rattled. The purpose of this explanation is that I have been hearing the same from fellow ranchers and hunters in regards to the lack of warning with rattlesnakes. I had lunch with a...

10-Year-Old Bit Multiple Times; Shirt Covered In Blood A Halloween party took a horrifying turn in Utah last weekend when a giant python attacked a 10-year-old boy. The 15-foot, 140-pound Burmese python and its handlers were hired for a Halloween celebration last Saturday at Cyprus Credit Union in West Jordan. When Jaren Barker went to hold the snake, it turned on him and bit the boy multiple times. "I didn't it even see it coming," he said. "It just bit me." Jaren's parents said the boy's shirt was covered in blood, sending the other children into a panic of crying...

DETROIT, - A dog has paid a heavy physical price for protecting his owner from a rattlesnake, his Michigan owner says. Kodi, a 3-year-old Samoyed, saved Brenda Lacroix of Davisburg from an Eastern Massasauga rattlesnake during a June walk in Shiawassee Basin Park in Springfield Township, Lacroix told the Detroit Free Press. "This thing flew at his face," said Lacroix, a retired veterinary technician. "It was 3 1/2 feet long and the width of my arm." Lacroix rushed Kodi's sagging body to her former employer as his face started to swell, and then the dog passed out. While one veterinarian...

CLEVELAND, Ohio --- Visitors to Cleveland Metroparks occasionally cross paths with a snake. But not a 9-foot-long, 18-pound Burmese python, which slithered Sunday into the Mill Stream Reservation's Paw Paw Picnic Area in North Royalton. The Cleveland Metroparks Zoo officials are hoping the owner will reclaim it. "This snake didn't fall out of the sky," zoo spokeswoman Sue Allen said. "It either escaped from its owner, or was let go. Since it's difficult for us to accommodate exotic species, we're hoping its owners reclaim it." The python was found around 4:30 p.m. by a park visitor, who called for ranger...

MT. HOLLY, NC - Folks living in North Carolina have a better chance of getting bitten by a snake than people living anywhere else, according to new research. North Carolina's estimated rate of snake bites is nearly five times the national average. The number one reason for the relatively high rate of bites is a snake found in every single North Carolina county -- the copperhead. Copperheads are poisonous -- although snake experts say the better term is venomous -- and last year there were 228 reported bites in the state. The copperhead is found in Charlotte and all over...

As venomous snakes go, the coral snake is a clumsy biter. Unlike pit vipers such as rattlesnakes and cottonmouths, which have gruesomely efficient fangs that articulate forward during a strike and inject venom like hypodermic needles, the brightly colored coral snake has small, rear-facing fangs that guide venom into a wound. This process doesn't always work well — experts estimate that 25 percent of coral snake envenomations are dry bites — which is perhaps why the coral is so unaggressive. The snake is found throughout Florida, as well as in parts of Alabama, South Carolina, Louisiana, Texas and Arizona, but...

Garofalo: Bible a 'Work of Fiction' for 'Child-Like Audience' By Nathan Burchfiel Created 06/25/2010 - 08:43 Sometime-comedian Janeane Garofalo never passes up an opportunity to slam conservatives or, apparently, Christianity. The Huffington Post gave her an opportunity June 24 to kill two birds with one stone. In an interview [1] promoting her upcoming special on a network called EPIX, Garofalo compared the most widely-read book of all time, the Bible, to a Bill O'Reilly autobiography and a children's book authored by former President Bush. When asked by a Huffington Post reader which of those three publications she'd rather read, Garofalo...

The confessed murderer of Stephany Flores described himself as "attractive, agnostic, a regular smoker and drinker" on YouTube and other social networking sites. Others said he was "twisted." Monday June 14, 2010 The media have written extensively about the confessed murderer of Stephany Flores, Dutchman Joran van der Sloot (22). He also covered himself, using internet social networking sites and YouTube. According to AP, Van der Sloot said in his YouTube page: "If I had to describe myself as an animal, it would be a snake." That's not all; he also said "I want to be a lion and a...

Mother Nature has a wrath like no other. A Nebraska man was strangled to death by his pet boa constrictor while showing the snake to a friend, police reported on Thursday. Cory Byrne was pronounced dead Wednesday after police and paramedics loosened the 9-foot, 25-pound snake's deadly squeeze, said police. The Nebraska Humane Society in Omaha, which currently has custody of the red-tailed constrictor, has not been able to determine what prompted the attack. The boa seemed to be well-fed, according to the Humane Society's spokesman, Mark Langan. "The sad reality is, whether it's a dog or a cat or...

A THREE-METRE python that swallowed a family's pet dog in Cairns has struck again, attempting to devour a chihuahua. But this time, the dog's owner was able to prevent the animal from becoming dinner, dragging it out of the snake's mouth... Australian Venom Zoo operator Stuart Douglas was called to remove the python, keeping it temporarily at his zoo before releasing it into the wild at a secret location... The same snake had stalked and eaten Dot, a nine-month-old Jack Russell terrier, while she was playing in her backyard ... Ms Stewart said she had become so distressed over the...

Saying it hurt worse than falling off a bike, 7-year-old Michael Harris has plans for the snake that bit his heel. "Jumped out and just snapped my foot," said Harris. The bite only lasted a moment, but Harris says the venom put him in pain. "It kind of (felt) like it's still biting you over and over," said Harris. "I couldn't keep my eyes open, I kept throwing up," said Harris. "I mostly couldn't breathe a lot." Harris blames his sandals for putting him in the hospital. "If I had my tennis shoes, I wouldn't be here right now," said...

MASON CITY, Iowa, - An Iowa court fined a man $65 for allowing his pet snake, a bull python, to wander the halls of the Holiday Inn. Michael Salo, 25, was fined Tuesday in a Mason City magistrate court under the city's animal control ordinance for letting the 5-year-old snake slither around the hallways of the hotel without supervision while Salo was staying at the hotel May 1, The (Mason City) Globe Gazette reported Wednesday. Hotel manager Brandy Smith Branstad said employees discovered the snake at about 7 a.m. May 1 and the reptile is not believed to have come...

GONZALES, La., - A Louisiana woman discovered a python in her car that dealership employees said belonged to a couple that nearly purchased the vehicle. Marquita Lawrence said she was driving in the Toyota Camry she had recently purchased from Hollingsworth Richards Used Cars in Gonzales when she saw a ball python crawl out from under the passenger seat to investigate her fried chicken, WAFB-TV, Baton Rouge, La., reported Wednesday. "I threw it in park and hauled tail and I did not look back. I'm running across the highway screaming, 'There's a snake in my car, there's a snake in...

Ah, Snake Plissken. Every movie hero is rendered 10% cooler when they have an eyepatch. The original “Escape From New York” remains a classic for who those of us (me) who grew up in the 80s and spent an inordinate amount of time imagining themselves as a kickass futuristic ex-con with a very low, gravelly voice. Anyway, they’ve tried reviving the Plissken character once before, with “Escape From LA” in ’96. That movie was tepidly received, so here comes a reboot of the original film itself, which was slated to star Gerard Butler, but lost him while gaining a director...

Humane Society: Owner Panicked When Python Disappeared The three-foot python found by a guest in a La Vista hotel Thursday belonged to a man from California. The Nebraska Humane Society says it located the owner through hotel receipts, then verified his story by viewing Facebook photos of the man with the snake. A guest at the Hampton Inn in La Vista discovered the python coiled on the toilet of her room. She caught it in a pillow case then called for help.

The Charlotte Observer has a follow-up about a man who was allegedly smacked in the head with a python. The story is chock full of win, but here's the Best Part: "The snake hit me on the side of my mouth and actually pulled the side of my mouth open," Culp said. ... "It took me three hours of showering and about six hours sittin' on the bed of rockin' back and forth to get that out of my mind," Culp said of the alleged assault.

RIVERSIDE, Calif., April 12 (UPI) -- A California animal control officer said she captured the "Monster of Lake Evans," a 15-foot Burmese python apparently abandoned by its owner. Riverside County Animal Control Officer Kristina Hillegart said she responded Friday to a report of a huge snake at Lake Evans in Riverside's Fairmont Park and discovered the 60-pound reptile near the bank of the lake, KTLA-TV, Los Angeles, reported Monday. Hillegart, who nicknamed the snake the "Monster of Lake Evans," said the snake did not put up too much resistance and was easily lured into the back of her vehicle. She...

MERRITT ISLAND, Fla.- Robert Tyler, a 53-year-old welder from Merritt Island, Fla., says the rattlesnake he killed to protect his neighbors "was a huge, beautiful diamondback." Florida Today reported Tyler came across the 6-foot-long rattlesnake Wednesday while driving along Captain's Row, a riverside community on the north side of the Merritt Island Causeway. Tyler said the snake, not a protected or endangered species, was crawling past the home of a woman who owned several small kittens, Florida Today reported, and rather than call authorities, he decided to kill the rattler on his own. "He could have gotten away just as...