"I can't believe this stuff, I thought the burms were killing everything."

The burms do have some negative impact on the ecosystem, but finding a non-biased report maybe difficult. My favorite review of this is from Barker and Barker.

http://www.vpi.com/sites/vpi.com/files/PP-and-Pythons_BarkerBarker.pdf


"There is one paper that estimates the cost of Burmese
pythons to Florida. Smith et al. (2007) estimated that
one Burmese python feeding in the Everglades did
wildlife damage ranging from $83,992.00 annually up
to $6 million in their worst case scenario. Extending
their worst case scenario, we figure that a population
of Burmese pythons estimated at 30,000 animals then
could “cost” Florida $180 billion in annual wildlife
losses, that being 25% of Florida’s annual GDP. If this
is a true estimate of value, then the total value of the
wildlife in South Florida alone must far exceed the
GDP of the nation, literally tens of trillions of dollars.
Frankly we are embarrassed that persons identifying
themselves as scientists would sign their names to a
paper containing such a ridiculous estimate. We would
argue that that it is equally likely that Burmese
pythons have a net positive effect on the South Florida
ecosystem. A proper evaluation, as is typically done
for laws based on the PP would investigate all
alternatives to the proposed law."

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