Python hunt
Rick Smith
Palm Beach (FL) Post
Thursday, May 30, 2024 4:46 p.m. ET
The Everglades python hunt is on! Snakes to be stalked in August. The prize is a lot bigger
Palm Beach Post
Florida's annual python hunt in the Everglades will run Aug. 9-18, Lt. Gov. Jeanette NunÞez announced Thursday morning at a news conference in Miami-Dade County.
Burmese Pythons are an invasive species that pose a threat to wildlife in the Everglades. Florida pays hunters annually to catch the snakes. State-approved hunters can win up to $25,000 this year, NunÞez said at the news conference outside Homestead.
The Burmese python is one of the largest snakes in the world and is not venomous. Adult snakes caught in Florida are between 6 and 9 feet on average, according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. The largest captured in Florida was more than 18 feet.
Longest pythons and the most caught will net prizes
Prizes will be awarded for the longest or most snakes caught, NunÞez said.
To register for the Florida Python Challenge, go to FLPythonChallenge.org.
Last year's hunt caught 209 snakes. The prize was $10,000.
A 2012 study suggested that in Everglades National Park, pythons were responsible for a decline of 85% to 100% of the population of medium-sized animals such as raccoons and rabbits.
The Burmese python invasion started with releases — intentional or not — of captive snakes, which likely gained a foothold in Everglades National Park by the mid-1980s, according to the 2021 Florida Python Control plan. By 2000, multiple generations of pythons were living in the park, which is noted in a more than 100-page 2023 report that summarized decades of python research.
Haphazard pursuits were undertaken to cull the writhing herd, but it wasn’t until 2019 that federal, state and nonprofit officials launched a python management planning group. In 2021, the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission made Burmese pythons a prohibited species.
Today, there are no reliable estimates of python abundance in Florida, the 2023 report says.
The study added that “eradication of the entire population across the landscape is not possible with any existing tools.”
From 2006 to 2023, 54 pythons have been captured in Palm Beach County, according to the Early Detection and Distribution Mapping System, or EDDMapS. In addition, four have been found dead, and 24 sightings have been reported.
The 54 that were captured include a 10-foot python caught and killed on an eastern levee at the Loxahatchee Refuge in 2016. Before that, one was found in a parking lot at the refuge. Another was seen in 2008 on a southern levee.
In 2019 there was an unconfirmed python sighting inside the refuge.
Rick Smith
5264 N. Fort Yuma Trail
Tucson, AZ 85750