Python Hunting Season set for South Florida

[morti]

Python hunting season set for South Florida - washingtonpost.com

The Associated Press
Monday, February 22, 2010; 12:53 PM

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- State wildlife officials have created a special python hunting season to try to stop the spread of the nonnative snakes throughout the Everglades.

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission says anyone with a hunting license who pays a $26 permit fee can kill the reptiles from March 8 to April 17 on state-managed lands around the Everglades in South Florida.

The season is open for Burmese and Indian pythons, African rock pythons, green anacondas and Nile monitor lizards.

Thousands of the nonnative Burmese pythons are believed to be in the region, upsetting the natural balance of the ecosystem.

Wildlife officials on Monday trained a group of hunters on how to identify, stalk, capture and remove them.

[LooseAFur]

Wow, this is crazy.

There will be all kind of idiot rednecks on youtube hunting these snakes.

[morti]

Originally Posted by SC_INK

Wow, this is crazy.

There will be all kind of idiot rednecks on youtube hunting these snakes.

What we need is a bunch of awesome herpers changing those perceptions, just like Greg Graziani has been doing:

Graziani Reptiles | Python Hunters Gallery | grazianireptiles.com

If we Herpers get down there and catch some burms, we might be able to lean a few things about the actual problem and be better armed to combat the misconceptions.

[LooseAFur]

I would love to do that, but I live in PA....

If we could start a foundation/society to do such a thing it would be great. People like myself could volunteer a weekend a year or something.

[snakehooked]

Huh....I'll talk to a couple people and see about trying to day-trip it down south.

[Aaron-Insular]

I so wanna do this... we can go out together and then have a burm burgers feast

[LooseAFur]

What is stopping people from capturing them here and shipping them back to their native land?

Im sure it isnt cheap, but wouldnt that be more ideal than having "huntin' seezin"

"Gone go shoot me wun ah them thare....Burmeeze Pie-thons Elroy, recon you wunna come with?"

[Aaron-Insular]

Originally Posted by SC_INK

What is stopping people from capturing them here and shipping them back to their native land?
Im sure it isnt cheap, but wouldnt that be more ideal than having "huntin' seezin"
"Gone go shoot me wun ah them thare....Burmeeze Pie-thons Elroy, recon you wunna come with?"

Do you have n e clue how much it would cost to ship hundreds if not thousands of live adult pythons across the world!?
Rednecks, juckets, hicks, hill billies... call them what you want but there is a huge problem down there not only threatening native habitat but also our right to keep these large constrictors!
With the cold spell already putting a dent in the population and hopefully disrupting this years breeding season a good ol' hunt could really help take down the numbers... - don't understand why your against this...
I understand I you see these gentle giants as a great companion but the truth is they really are a problem. The real propaganda is when the media tries to act like they can live up north, that's a load of.... but they definetely are a problem in So Fl... so why not let ppl hunt, mount, eat them, make boots and belts and hand bags... it's better then them over hunting crocs!

[morti]

Originally Posted by SC_INK

What is stopping people from capturing them here and shipping them back to their native land?
Im sure it isnt cheap, but wouldnt that be more ideal than having "huntin' seezin"
"Gone go shoot me wun ah them thare....Burmeeze Pie-thons Elroy, recon you wunna come with?"

Way back in August of 2009 I typed a really long response to this attitude. Since I hate typing the same thing twice:

This is going to be a long post. Please bear with me.

Our lawmakers are being swayed by people who have a very specific agenda. HSUS seems to think that no private individual should be allowed to keep exotic pets. They see no exceptions. These are the people who have our congresspersons' ears. HSUS probably doesn't give two hoots about the problems in the everglades. They are using this to push their agenda. I don't know why this is their agenda. I guess we just have to accept that people are capable of being irrational.

The lawmakers are listening to HSUS and saying "Hey... we really do have a problem down in the everglades. Giant Baby Killer Snakes are running Rampant down there. We have to be seen to be doing something". That's the important part. So Senator Nelson, in his wisdom of being seen to be doing something, is fighting this "war" on two fronts. He is addressing the perceived underlying problem by trying (quite successfully) to stop further imports, and he is attempting to address the visible issue by working to allow "Snake Hunters" in Everglades National Park.

I think that he knows very well that stopping the import of pythons isn't really going to do a thing to solve the problem, but he is being seen to be working on the actual issue at hand by trying to cleanse Florida of the evil killer reptiles that are already there.

That's where we come in. Right now, as Louise's conversation with the office of Rep. Meeks proved, the lawmakers view we, the "Reptile Nation" as doing nothing productive. They view us as simply whining about the law. We need to take a politics lesson from the congress people. We need to make the news.

One very important thing that we can do to appear to be doing something is for everyone who is able to get out there and try to find some burms. It may not really help anything in the long run, but it will let people know that we really are concerned about this issue. Now, what do we do with them once we find them? Vietnam doesn't want them back, and it would cost too much to ship them there.

A Burm Sanctuary? Here is some really conservative math. Let's pretend that we can actually capture half of the snakes out of the everglades. Let's also pretend that there are 100,000 snakes in the everglades.

I can get a freedom breeder 8'x3' rack that will house three snakes for $2598.75. 50,000 burms would require 16,666 of them. That is $43,310,767.50 worth of cages. Each rack takes up 64 Sq. Ft. of floor space [8 ft long * (3 ft wide + 5 ft "aisle")]. That would require 1,066,624 square feet. I am not even going to hazard a guess what kind of money it would cost to build that size warehouse... or how much it would cost to climate control it.

So it is really easy to see why that is impractical.

So we can't leave them alone in the wild, we can't send them back to where they came from, and we can't keep them all. We are quickly running out of options here.

Phenobarbitol is considered the most humane method of dispatching anything really. Let's err on the high side and say it costs $10 per shot. That's $500,000 (and the government would most likely happily buy it.) Senator Nelson suggested Machetes. A $20 machete keeps working again and again. Blunt head trauma is considered more humane than decapitation. A $20 sledge hammer keeps working too.

Killing them is the only reasonable idea. The concept of selling them out of state is good, but I think you would run out of homes for angry wild caught burms faster than you would run out of burms.

So those of you who are sad at killing burms, I can understand how you feel. It is not a good thing that has happened in the everglades, and there is no happy solution to this very unhappy problem. We will be dealing with it and hearing about it for years to come. That is the reality of the situation and no amount of wishing it better will make it right.

What can we do on a local level to help? The idea of doing educational presentations is a very good one. LdyDrgn and I have been doing them for years, and we will continue to do so. We need to make the news in a positive light too. We need images of cute little kids grinning while having a positive experience with reptiles.

When it comes time to vote on this in the house and on the senate floor, then we will need everyone to call, write, and send faxes and e-mails again. This time it will be to your state congresspeople.

-Your Sick Uncle Morti.

For the original context, please see this thread:
17 footer killed

[LooseAFur]

No I agree with you. And yes I know it would be expensive to ship them. Also if they were released into the wild then shipped to India, they might not survive there.

Yeah I guess the hunting isnt a bad idea I just dont like the sound of it all i guess. Know what I mean?

[morti]

On a personal yet public note SC_Ink, you are are not impressing me personally by making fun of Southerners or Hunters. Also, your gross characture of the "Redneck Accent" turns my stomach. I suggest you consider who you are making fun of when you make fun of Rednecks. I can take a joke as well as the next man just so long as the joke is funny.

I blame Jeff Foxworthy. Because he can make fun of rednecks, everybody seems to think that it is not discrimination for them to do so.

Sorry. Rant over. Back on topic.

[LooseAFur]

Publicly, Im sorry if I offended anyone. But you all know the kind of Youtube crap I am talking about. Technically you could call me a redneck. I live in the country, wear cowboy boots and chew tobacco. I guess I was kinda making fun of myself in a way, Didnt mean to offend anyone. I'll just go crawl into a hole somewhere now. ok bye

[RayRay]

Fun Factiod:
RayRay comes from the sticks...
and now lives in the bad part of town.

[telefrag]

as unfortunate as it is, there really isn't any other way.

and partially we (snake keepers) are to blame.

[rellek]

not all hunters are rednecks.

[RayRay]

Originally Posted by telefrag

as unfortunate as it is, there really isn't any other way.

and partially we (snake keepers) are to blame.

I agree.

We could have piped up sooner when this was really starting to become a problem.

[BlackLava]

im sure there are tons of other "invasive wildlife" living down there, why is the hunt only for pythons (and the one species of monitor)? if they wanna stop the invasive wildlife why not let people hunt for all the other invasives too? everything is so focused on getting rid of the horrible man eating pythons, like they are the only ones supposedly causing a problem. THAT is what makes me sick.

[blueboykennels]

Originally Posted by rellek

not all hunters are rednecks.

That is true, also not all rednecks are hunters. Some of us ( I mean them) fish. Not saying anything is wrong with hunting as I hunt myself. Also there are ALOT of wild life conservation programs that are funded by hunters.

[LdyDrgn]

Because no one is "askurred" of the Zebra muscles, Cane Toads, Kudzu.... etc....

[morti]

... or the feral cats.