Reptile & Amphibian Forums

More bad press. I saw this article in the USA Today paper this morning. Here's the link to the article on their site.

Pythons could squeeze lower third of USA- USA Today

At least it points out that they're generally not a danger to people.

aside from the obvious scare tactics of this trash article, they forgot to mention the upsides i'll bet the pythons would looove nutria (another invasive species) found in the southeast, and if i ran into a wild 250lb python well thats a new belt, wallet, and new boots for me, not to mention a freezer full of delicious meat. (uuum joke of course...) maybe they would eat coyotes (not an invasive species but a really annoying one) and so what if they take out a few of those nasty little yappy dogs and feral cats that are killing off the wild bird populations. now lets start spraying down these ultra liberals with artificial gerbil scent and drop them off in the everglades. BTW USA today is about one step away from being sold at the checkout counter next to the national enquirer and "Bat Boy Found in Arkansas"
Mike
tongue firmly in cheek

"not poisonous" .... well duh--- neither is that spitting cobra that sleeps under my couch...

"not a danger to people" "if you see one- do not engage-- leave the area" ... now what? I thought they weren't a danger...

and please show me a 20 foot 250 lb burm.... PLEASE!!

I have a 14 footer and a 15 footer ..... i've not seen bigger- but i know mine certainly aren't the biggest.... but please!

ugh-- can I get some of that artificial gerbil scent... i've got a few certain inlaws that would love a trip to florida... uh... well... nevermind... *cough cough*

this stuff nauseates me-- but i have had a suprizing increase in the # of calls wanting to adopt burms recently... they are usually harder to adopt than iguanas...
odd... wonder if its related...

Beth
-----
The rescue site: www.freewebs.com/okreptilerescue

This is by no means an attack to you, but I think the author goggled burmese pythons and came across Baby. Baby is probably the most infamous burmese python that topped at 20ft and weighed around that. Figures that the author uses the extreme case to make his/her article to go with his/her agenda.

on a false premise. The most realistic scenario for global warming causes most of the area in question to be drier than the dust bowl. It will be warm but far too dry to worry about burm infestation. As for the far left, my inlaws are neo-con nut bars and they are all for banning snakes.
-----
I eat human infants. They, like everything else, taste like chicken. What?

I was reading through some of the comments on that page, (not all of them, there were about 60-70 pages of them), and Egregious put it best:
"'one-third of the USA, from San Francisco across the Southwest, Texas and the South and up north along the Virginia coast'

I thought all that was supposed to be underwater from the melting ice caps?"

Rofl.

And another comment by Duane:
"...Any mathematical model is only as accurate as its assumptions and these assumptions of what will change between now and 2100 are far beyond the realm of reasonable prediction. It is complete stupid to even talk about it.."

I cut part of that comment out, because it was fairly long. Very interestingly put though, and i wish i could have posted it all, but nobody would like how long it would get.

Just a few highlights from the (very entertaining) comments section.
-----
-Jacob