Many Floridians want to get rid of the Burmese python. The snakes are destroying the wildlife in the Everglades for simple reasons.
“It has to do with food and sex,” said U.S. Geological Survey research ecologist Kristen Hart. Hart led a study into why the pythons are in the Everglades.
The study found that the pythons are eating the wildlife in the Everglades, then mating and increasing the numbers of the snakes. They are the main predators in the national park.
For those hunting the pythons, mating could be lead to a way to find the predators.
“You could use radio tracking during the breeding season in a very focused location to try to find breeding animals at that site,” said Hart.
While many want to rid the Everglades of the pythons, the 19-feet reptiles are hard to find.
“They’re the color of mud and palm trees and detritus and leaves. And they’re quiet,” said Hart.
The pythons are crossing over the Everglades’ main roads and are rarely detected.
“It just shows how difficult it is to see them,” said Hart. “We definitely know that they crossed the road based on their location. But no one saw them.”
“Some tree islands consist of rough terrain with nearly impenetrable vegetation, making surveys for secretive animals in such habitats extremely difficult,” wrote the researchers in the study.
The study of pythons found that many are found in tree islands.”To date, no organized searches for pythons on tree islands in (the Everglades) have been initiated, but resource managers may need to give consideration to python search efforts in these habitats as data from radio-tagged pythons indicates that they spend long periods of time there,” noted the study.
GPS tags on the pythons in the study could help in the hunt for the animals.”Nowadays, we can get more locations per day and night with the GPS tags which we have not had before,” said Hart.
“We can collect many more locations per animal per whatever time period. We can piece together an animal’s movement path at a much finer scale than if we only used radio tags,” added Hart.
