Kingsnake.com - Herpforum - I think it is a serious matter

Posted by: odatriad at Fri Dec 9 18:17:54 2005 [ Email Message ] [ Show All Posts by odatriad ]

Pound for pound, I think that a single nile monitor will consume significantly more food than a single burmese python will. Due to the activity levels, and highly aquatic nature of V. niloticus, they are also more capable of a much quicker dispersal rate than burmese pythons.

Nile monitors are agile and skillfull swimmers and climbers, and have powerful limbs which aid in digging/unearthing. These predators(nile monitors) are more capable of directly affecting a greater number of animal species through predation, being that they are able to employ many different tactics of capturing/subdueing prey(digging, diving, breaking open rotten logs, etc.); many of which a burmese python is not capable of doing.

In regards to hunting strategies/prey capture, Burmese Pythons are much more limited in the diversity of species which they can directly affect through predation. Nile monitors on the other hand, I feel, have a greater potential for ecological disturbance and harmful effects on endemic wildlife, being that they will eat just about anything- whether it be insects, crustaceans, fish, turtles, lizards, snakes, crocodilians and their eggs, mammals, or birds...

Therefore I disagree with you, in that I feel that the feral population of Nile Monitors in south Florida is a serious risk(perhaps one of the most serious invasive risks to FL). While southern Florida certainly has its share of invasive 'pest' species-whether they be plants or animals, I do not think there is any other introduced predatory species(to date, at least), that poses as great a threat to Florida wildlife, as the Nile Monitor.
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