Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Just wanted to point out the Sun Sentinel in South Florida (newspaper) has an article about the Cold Snap today 02/11/2010.

It's the front page. In the article they mention half the Burmese population being dead, they talk about the Bill briefly that "all reptile hobbyist are against."

The picture of the Burmese on the front page is dead, anyway the back of his head looks like it has a bullet hole in it.

They have a website so check out the article it has informatoin about Iquanas and fish as well.

I'm not real impressed with this articel being a reptile lover myself.
Link

I was by the Glades last weekend and was told by guy there who works for parks water dept that EVERY single python the state had with a chip in it was dead.
He has worked there 15 yrs and knows whats going on there .

They think 80% min are dead in the states feral population. As of now they think the one's that may have lived are due to moving to warm water like croc water Turkey nuke power plant and few other limited areas .

So much for the theory that they could expand to even N.Florida and live never mind in northern states..

2 weeks of cold here in Miami has been like a nuke bomb to these snakes imagine months of cold further north.

I am not to sure that those who want to ban exotic pets and ban pythons,snakes as pets not to mention those who make a living off state python programs want the results published.

I dont own pythons but going to Glades a lot and knowing people who work there . I always found this python hysteria absurd and they all agree.

OK, well I am the person that tracks the pythons and I can tell you that not "every" python we are tracking died.

There was a lot of mortality though.

Mike

Mike - what percentage are dead? Of those alive, how are they doing, and what refuge kept them alive?

Why isn't there a release of information after the last couple of weeks cold in FL?

I can't speak about the specifics until it's published but it will be out soon. Skip told me that he wants to get this thing published before the public hearing is over so that we don't take a lot of heat and get accused of some kind of conspiracy (as we already have been, lol). There will be details on every one of our telemetered snakes and any other snakes found and reported to us between the cold front and approx. Feb 4. I'm not sure if the snakes Tom reported (in another thread) will make it into the paper or not but I've passed the info along to Skip.

About the most I can say is that there has been a good deal of mortality (as has been reported elsewhere). The details about the questions you asked will all be in the paper and supporting documents online ASAP. We want this to be a careful peer-reviewed effort given the amount of criticism the USGS report received for not being peer-reviewed.

I hope everyone understands the delay and knows we're not trying to hide anything to get the legislation passed. I don't even want the legislation to pass.

Mike

Mike the problem we have is the HUGE amount of false info that someone is spoonfeeding to various news agencies and the public perception that Pythons may soon live in Washington D.C. When are you guys, THE SCIENTIST, going to step forward and set the record straight. All I'm asking for is the TRUTH. Your delays in this only damage us [herpers] in the perception of the average layman. All this stupidness thus far has taken a life of it's own and people are actually afraid that a giant snake will eat their dog or perhaps their children. We accepted responsibility for our part but when are you guys going to accept the responsibility of fearmongering? This needs to be done and soon...
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Tom Crutchfield
www.tomcrutchfield.com

Watcha gonna do?

Bill

Mike is doin' what he do, he doesn't control the deal, why are you asking him to? Help the scientists out, for cryin' out loud. If I wanted the truth, I'd wait for the paper to be published, read it, then ask the writers, is this what you wrote? Then, they could answer ALL the questions and refute if/where they were misquoted/edited. Yes? I think he gave you as good an answer as you're gonna get for now, sounds to me that more died than not, let's hope for another nice cold snap to add to the #'s and we got some good data to use in the coming fight.
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Todd Hughes

Let me share..

My mother in-law, God bless her, called the other week to speak with me, not my wife. She stated that she could not sleep and that she had to ask me to get rid of my python, which is a retic, a super dwarf retic. I have had this snake for over 10 years but since all of this BS has hit the media she now is scared to death for us. The snake is well under 10 feet and weighs about 3 pounds, I've seen black rat snakes that are bigger.

So I would like to know also. Who is to blame for the bogus information campaign?

I'm most interested in the state of health/condition of the survivors, and their prognosis for the future without intervention by man.
Seems to me a helpless cold stunned python would provide an opportunity for quite a feast for any number of warm blooded carnivorous opportunistic predators.
I would also like to know the micro-climate/milieu responsible for their survival. Genetics would be helpful, as well as sex, length, weight, approximate age, and how long have they been tracked in the system.
Thanks,
jsc
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"As hard as I've tried, just can't NOT do this"
John Crickmer

"I would also like to know the micro-climate/milieu responsible for their survival"

Fantastic question. Considering that every fish in my area in canals died . Canals which are 10 feet deep and hold heat much longer than the ground and we lost roughly 80% of the NATIVE green anoles in my area and every iguana.

I to would love to know how in the world these pythons made it. The guy we know who works for water dept told us all dead he knows his stuff but if this man Mike studies them than so be it but your question is great.

Keep in mind we are talking about 2 weeks of cold imagine months of freezing temps in most states

Okay thanks like I said the man we know works for Glades dept of water he isn't a biologist but he has always been correct however you actually track them he doesn't.

I am surprised any lived it was a cold cold 2 weeks still chilly at nights now.

I have seen some iguanas here in Ft. Lauderdale that survived the big chill. They look dark, sickly and deflated. I think they are too doomed. They don’t look good. There are vastly reduced numbers where there were very many before. It is quite apparent that most were killed. This is along the east side of town and New River where it did not get nearly as cold as the interior areas. I have no doubt there are some Burmese that survived the big chill alive right now, that will be dead soon as well. If any of the radio transmitter fitted pythons survived the initial chill (the sample was only ten pythons, wasn’t it?) I believe they will all- 100% - be dead within just a few weeks. I have to wonder about the secrecy and rush to finalize the findings before the death toll does hit 100%, as it most probably will. How does a tropical burmese python survive when crocodiles living in the artificially warm cooling canals of the nuclear power plant die from the cold?

I am in Miami which as a whole is warmer than most of Florida other than the Keys. It was 42 degrees today at 6am.

You are so right . I wonder a month from now how many of the surviving pythons will be left if the report comes out a month from now it might be very different than it is now because we are still sceduled for nights in 40s this week alone.

I particularly love house geckoes as they are 100% harmless natures night mosquito eaters .

I had countless living all around the house (outside) for yrs now imagine from I have seen warm night we have had maybe lost 95% of the population.
The big dominant pair who live under patio awning and get some heat as thats attached to the house have lived all the rest dead in place.

I would think the remaining pythons must have found some type man created heat source or they would die.

My daughter is a grad stident at FIU, and lives in N. Miami Beach next to Greynolds Park. She has not seen a living iguana since the cold snap and only one gecko. They're all gone.

This morning when I left the house at 6am it was around 60 degrees and I saw a few by front of house by porch light.

I was so happy . Till than I had only seen one pair in yard with major wipe out.
Tonight in Miami it drops to mid 40s again its been a horrible winter by Miami standards. Your daughter is 30 minutes from me going North so we have same temps.
I like FIU its a nice school and good security .

We used to have a big stunner of an iguana who lived in area what a great guy we . Few neighbors would leave out bananas , tomatoes ,etc .
He must have died as gone and the smaller one's and females gone also.

She's a grad student, and likes it quite a bit. 5 years from know she gets her PhD. As a parent, I appreciate the free ride she's gotten as far as tuition is concerned.