NONFICTION/SCIENCE LEXILE 1240 The Snake That s Eating Florida 4 Scholastic Action January 18, 2016
Deadly pythons are taking over one of America s most prized wilderness areas. Is there anything we can do to stop them? By Lauren Tarshis CLICK WORDS FOR MORE! VOCABULARY wetlands: marshy land with wet soil species: a particular type of animal or plant climate: the usual weather in a certain place camouflage: coloring that makes animals, people, or objects blend in with their surroundings importing: bringing something to a place from another country ANDY KINGSBURY/CORBIS TURN THE PAGE â January 18, 2016 5
One January morning in 2003, a group of families was exploring Everglades National Park. Located in the state of Florida, this beautiful wilderness is made up of 2,500 square miles of protected wetlands. Rivers of golden grass stretched out in all directions, and the visitors heard frogs singing and crickets chirping. The group had high hopes that they might see a blue heron, a snowy egret, or even a Florida panther. As it turned out, the visitors were about to see something even more unusual and quite horrifying a huge alligator wrestling an enormous snake; they later learned it was a Burmese python. The alligator had its jaws clamped around the snake, and the snake was wrapped around the alligator as the animals struggled like two monsters in a horror film. Some of the visitors took videos, and within days, the videos appeared on TV and websites worldwide. Most people who saw the videos found them either thrilling or gross, but to many wildlife experts, the wrestling match between the two animals was evidence of a big, slithery problem. Out of Place Burmese pythons are not naturally found in the Everglades, or anywhere in North America, because the species is native to southern Asia. But for years, some park officials had noticed Burmese pythons living and breeding in the Everglades; they had become worried that these huge snakes could begin to have a disastrous effect on the environment there. Burmese pythons first came to the United States as pets in the 1990s. As babies, curled into This pet python had to be removed from its owner when it grew to be 18 feet long and 30 inches around. Burmese pythons eat almost anything, including rabbits, bobcats, raccoons, and even deer. tiny coils, pythons look cute, at least to some people. But then these little snakes grow to more than 20 feet and 250 pounds, and a hungry snake eats an enormous number of live animals. People who bought a Burmese python as a pet often eventually regretted it, and many of them ended up setting their unwanted snakes loose in the wild. In addition, some pythons may have been set free by accident. In 1992, Hurricane Andrew slammed into Florida, wrecking thousands of buildings. Some of those buildings held businesses that sold different pets from around the world, like baby Burmese pythons, and some of these snakes may have ended up in the Everglades. GEORGE SKENE/MCT/GETTY IMAGES (PET PYTHON); ISTOCKPHOTO.COM (ALL OTHER IMAGES) 6 Scholastic Action January 18, 2016
In a fight to the death, a Burmese python exploded after trying to eat an alligator in the Florida Everglades. MICHAEL BARRON/EVERGLADES NATIONAL PARK/MCT/NEWSCOM In many areas of the U.S., a python would die of cold or hunger in the wild, but that s not the case in Florida, where the warm, moist climate is perfect for pythons. Snake Invaders Burmese pythons are an invasive species a type of animal or plant brought into a new environment that damages the animals and plants already living there. About 4,300 invasive species live in the U.S., and some of them have caused terrible damage. One example is mongooses in Hawaii, first brought there from Jamaica by farmers more than 100 years ago for the purpose of killing rats. The mongooses didn t get rid of the rats, but they did eat so many bird eggs that some kinds of birds disappeared as the number of mongooses grew. Today on some Hawaiian islands, the air is strangely quiet, without a bird to be heard, because the mongooses ate them all. Experts say something similar is now happening in Florida, as pythons eat almost anything. That includes reptiles, bird eggs, and even large animals like deer. According to The New York Times, foxes and rabbits seem to have disappeared from the Everglades. Raccoons, deer, opossums, and bobcats have almost vanished as well. TURN THE PAGE â www.scholastic.com/actionmag January 18, 2016 7
A female Burmese python can lay as many as 100 eggs in one nest. BURMESE PYTHON INVASION OF THE U.S.? AL If the invasion continues, pythons could spread across the southern one-third of the U.S. The area in dark green on the map at right has a climate similar to the snake s native habitat in Asia. GA FLORIDA Gulf of Mexico Everglades National Park ATLANTIC OCEAN Orlando Miami CA WA OR ID UT Climate matching that of the pythons native habitat in Asia Burmese pythons have been found throughout Florida, with the greatest number in Everglades National Park. NV AZ MT WY NM CO ND SD TX NE KS OK MN IA MO AR LA WI Area of inset map MI NH VT NY GA PA IL IN OH WV VA KY TN NC SC MS AL FL ME MA RI CT NJ DE MD DC We Are at War A female Burmese python can lay as many as 100 eggs in one nest, which makes the snakes a quickly growing population in the Everglades. The National Park Service recently reported that about 100,000 pythons live in the park. However, an exact number of them is impossible to determine, as their green-and-brown scales provide excellent camouflage and allow them to blend right in with the marsh. In 2012, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service banned the importing of Burmese pythons, but the python invasion of the Everglades is already a crisis for the environment. The National Park Service has hired scientists to find and trap snakes, and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) asks people to report python sightings at www.ivegot1.org. In 2013, the FWC organized a Python Challenge hunt, and another hunt will take place starting January 16, 2016. As one ranger puts it, We are at war. So far, the battle resembles that wrestling match between the alligator and the python. The struggle will likely continue for quite some time, and right now, nobody can say for sure who will win. MAP: JIM MCMAHON/MAPMAN ; MAP SOURCE: U.S. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY. PHOTO: ISTOCKPHOTO.COM 8 Scholastic Action January 18, 2016