COLLIER COUNTY, Fla. — They’re often called the biggest snake on the planet, reaching lengths of as much as 25 toes and weighing virtually 500 kilos.
Now officers suppose they might be residing right here in Southwest Florida. We’re speaking concerning the inexperienced anaconda.
It’s an Amazon River monster thats already been documented a number of instances in Florida over the previous 20 years.
However now the U.S. Geological Survey thinks a colony might be residing in Fakahatchee Strand Protect in Collier County.
However with solely a small handful of those snakes discovered over the previous 20 years, what number of may really be on the market?
At a steamy 82 levels, final night time alongside U.S. 41 was the right situation for catching snakes. We tagged together with novice python hunters Steven Gauta and Jake Waleri, the identical hunters that not too long ago caught the longest Burmese python ever documented at 19 toes lengthy.
It didn’t take lengthy for us to seek out ourselves a Burmese python hatchling, together with plenty of different native snakes — like a banded water snake, the uncommon tough inexperienced snake and the venomous cottonmouth.
However amongst all these snakes, it begs the query: The place are the anacondas?
Dr. Andrew Durso, a herpetologist from FGCU, defined that it might be for a number of causes.
“I believe that’s the query, are they established?” Durso mentioned. “They’re actually troublesome to detect, they’re much more aquatic than Burmese pythons. So that they spend much more time within the water, so that you wouldn’t even discover them, particularly someplace out within the Fakahatchee the place folks don’t go.”
On prime of that, in contrast to the nests of eggs Burmese pythons will lay, inexperienced anacondas give dwell beginning, which implies they don’t even have to depart the water to do it.
“We gained’t know till we observe replica within the wild if it’s taking place, however absence of proof is just not proof of absence.” Dr. Durso added.
And whereas Durso mentioned he believes the surroundings right here is appropriate for them, with so many snake hunters already on the market, you’d suppose extra would have been caught by now if there have been a colony, which leads some like Steven Gauta to suppose the information is extra about cracking down on invasive reptiles.
“However it does appear to be type of coincidental that this curiosity in inexperienced anacondas is going on proper round a time a number of payments or legal guidelines which are being launched to crack down on reptile transport and reptile keepers,” Gauta mentioned.
Leaving the potential for a breeding colony of inexperienced anacondas within the Everglades nonetheless inside the realm of thriller.
“There’s all the time folks attempting to say they’ve a spot the place this actually cool distinctive animal, or the place they are saying this cool distinctive animal. It’s virtually in search of Bigfoot generally. I imply, positive possibly it’s on the market, however most likely not.” Gauta added.
This article by Alex Howard was first printed by ABC-7 on 1 August 2023.
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