Posted on 02/19/2023 5:18:15 AM PST by where's_the_Outrage?
After nearly five months of waiting, an alarm activated on Michael Cove’s radio, a sign his study was working.
To hunt pythons, an invasive predator in the Florida Keys, Cove and fellow researchers have been strapping GPS collars to opossums and raccoons. When one was eaten by a python in September, researchers programmed the device to notify them from within the snake’s stomach....
According to a ScienceDaily study, the number of raccoons, opossums and bobcats in the Everglades all dropped by at least 87 percent between 1997 and 2012. The same study found that marsh and cottontail rabbits and foxes had disappeared from the area.....
Cove developed a new approach. He said he bought 30 GPS collars for about $1,000 apiece, then caught opossums and raccoons in the area and bolted a collar around their necks with a leather strap in late April. Cove said the collars don’t place animals in greater danger of being eaten.
Researchers programmed an alert to sound when the collars stop moving for more than four hours, Cove said. That could signal that a python consumed the collar-wearing mammal and was resting to digest....
Last week, however, the researchers confronted an obstacle. Their radios buzzed, and they tracked down the GPS collar. It was sitting among a python’s feces, researchers said, likely because the snake had swallowed and digested the collar.
Forty other animals were outfitted with collars, but researchers have encountered other roadblocks, Cove said. Six of the animals have disappeared, and a few others were struck by cars, he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at msn.com ...
Surprised they haven't caught a gator yet digesting a collar.
I wonder if the collars couldn’t be designed to activate when they come into contact with the snake’s digestive juices?
I don’t know where the $30K came from, but I welcome ANY effort to eradicate this species. I get the feeling that the average US citizen has no clue as to the severity of the problem in the Everglades.
This is WAY above my concern for the Ukraine. WAY above. I wonder what sort of plan they could come up with for a few billion Mitch dollars.
Regardless, more needs to be done. It’s not going to snow in Miami anytime soon (which would take care of most of them).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qdI4kmvVqfc
Another reason...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qdI4kmvVqfc
Another reason...
Above post(s) are for 5 lbs of possum in my headlights tonight.
Put a decent bounty on them. Raise it substantially as it gets harder to find them. With motivation man can wipe out damn near anything.
At one time, this proved true with wolves and coyotes in the Eastern United States. Then the damned eco-freaks started reintroducing them.
While still not a menace to the extent they are in the west, I know quite a few rural people here in SW Pennsylvania who have had encounters with coyotes, almost unheard of when we moved here two decades ago.
With motivation man can wipe out damn near anything...
Including the planet!!
sarc.
The show “Swamp People” have some of their stars in Florida hunting them. A bounty of $300 per head.
That’s because the opossums can’t carry cell phones.
Place a bounty on every python caught. The only ones getting paid are contracted members of the PATRIC Program and winners during the Florida Python Challenge.
https://myfwc.com/wildlifehabitats/nonnatives/python/removing/
Have a few more python hunting contests like this one.
https://myfwc.com/news/all-news/python-challenge-1022/
Iguanas are an invasive species to Florida and there is a bounty of eight dollars per iguana.
https://biobubblepets.com/the-fwcs-iguana-removal-service-helping-to-control-the-invasive-species-population-in-florida/
Here’s an iguana hunter in southern FL.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCNIJLU6qwY&ab_channel=RajTheIGUANAMAN
Here’s a woman who hunts them, too.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=64_o5f8wIFQ&ab_channel=IguanaSolutions
Florida teen wins competition by capturing 28 Burmese pythons
Forgive me if this is a stupid question, as I have no knowledge of these animals or of what Florida regulations are.
Why doesn’t the state declare a bounty on these snakes?
I think a better way I saw recently was attaching a GPS device to male pythons and releasing them, which instinctively they search out female pythons in large numbers and killing the females whenever possible because one female can produce dozens of eggs and replicate quickly
At least they aren’t using AIM-9 missiles.
Seems like it would be easier to raise rabbits.
Easier to put the collars on.
No trapping required.
How many times is that GPS going to be inside alligators or crocodiles?
Once again, a problem caused by idiot people.
THey shoukd just up the ante and up the permits to hunt the snakes, and emphasize that they should not risk catching the snakes alive, but should shoot from a safe distance.
While its pretty profitable to hunt them dead or alive now, a ,ot more people would be on board if it was more profitable. The snake issue (and other invasive species issue like large monitor lizards and such) is a huge issue that could be far better handled, but apparently the powers that be aren’t serious about eradicating a species that is devastating the ecosystem down there.
Yep! For a couple billion dollars tk fund a snake posse group, they could assemble a very large team of expert hunters and trackers, and make a huge dent In the snake problem down there.
the swamps are tough to navigate, and it wouldn’t likely result in all the snakes meeting their demise, but given enough $$ incentive, good folks would likely,jump at th3 chance to make a really decent income. That would be a few billion dollars well spent, as snakes are wiping out certain species in certain areas. Folks claim that the swamps are eerily devoid of creatures now in some places, because of the snakes
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