Reptile & Amphibian Forums

{Two photos at URL link below}

THE SUN (London, UK) 20 July 05 Open fried, you're dead
Photo: You're hisstory ... snake struck at fence after getting in tangle with wires
It’s fang you and goodnight for this giant snake — as it chomps into an electric fence.
Game wardens saw the 20ft rock python bite at the fence after getting its tail tangled on the cables.
When they slit it open to examine the snake’s bulging belly at the Silent Valley Game Ranch in South Africa they found a whole antelope carcass.
A spokesman said: “Usually the snake will hide to digest its meal.”
Guess this beast hadn’t adder nuff.
Photo: Oh deer ... earlier meal visible
http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2005330380,00.html
Open fried, you're dead

{Wes Comment: Two things here ... first; with the I-net, events long past are given "new life" when circulated to people far away with no experience with the original event ... and second; "pranksters" can use anything, domestic or foreign, to influence the gullible or innocent that something unuasual is going on. Orson Wells would be proud. By the way, this item has a photo of the python's prey that I have not seen elsewhere.}

GULF NEWS (Dubai, United Arab Emirates) 22 July 05 'Jebel Ali' snake spotted dead in South Africa (Daniel Bardsley)
Dubai: Snakes alive! Gulf News has solved the mystery of the animal that pranksters claimed was terrorising Jebel Ali.
All those worried about the snake featured in photographs e-mailed locally have two reasons to stay calm firstly the animal's home is South Africa, and secondly it died several years ago.
As revealed in Gulf News on Wednesday, photographs of the snake have been circulating in the UAE along with warnings that it is an anaconda marauding through Jebel Ali.
It is an African rock python that died after being trapped in a fence in Silent Valley Ranch in South Africa.
However, it turns out the animal is an African rock python that died after being trapped by a fence in Silent Valley Ranch in South Africa.
The sharp-toothed reptile was then skinned by wildlife enthusiasts who discovered an impala the snake's last meal inside.
The pictures were taken four years ago by Mike Johnson, co-owner of Silent Valley Ranch, after the snake got caught in an electric fence that surrounds a breeding ground for endangered sable antelope.
Johnson told Gulf News from his ranch that the snake became stuck because of its full belly and then perished after suffering multiple pulses of electricity from the fence.
The sharp-toothed reptile was skinned by wildlife enthusiasts who discovered an impala — the snake’s last meal.
"The snakes are a protected species but they are fairly plentiful on our ranch we've got dozens of them.
"The one that unfortunately got caught was a particularly big creature it was more than four metres long. It had swallowed an adult impala which is about the size of a goat.
"The fence is designed just to give a nasty shock but as this snake was tangled up in it, it got repeated jolts and that's what killed it. If it had touched it and turned away nothing would have happened," he said.
The rock python is Africa's largest snake and survives by eating mammals and birds, which it kills by wrapping its body around them before swallowing them head first.
Normally the snake will go and hide in an abandoned burrow or hollow tree after eating a big meal.
Photographs of the snake have been circulating in the UAE along with warnings that it is an anaconda marauding through Jebel Ali.
This snake was possibly on its way to find a quiet spot when it became trapped and its fangs were entangled in the wires.
Johnson's wife emailed some of the pictures of the snake out to friends and he thinks this is how they ended up being sent out to web users across the world.
The photographs have surfaced in the United States and United Kingdom as well as the UAE.
The snake tale is not the only mischievous falsehood currently putting UAE residents in a spin.
Some people have been spreading rumours through SMS that food has been contaminated with HIV, the virus that causes Aids.
Officials at Dubai Municipality reassured residents that research has shown food cannot transmit HIV and told people they can eat at local restaurants without fear of becoming infected.
'Jebel Ali' snake spotted dead in South Africa

http://www.bushveld.co.za/pictures-python.htm