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Snakes Spread North from Florida, Cause Concern for Scientists
06/24/09 - 01:52 PM

Associated Press

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Scientists at the Savannah River Ecology Lab in South Carolina want to know, can Burmese pythons that have been spreading north in Florida survive in places like the Carolinas, or Tennessee?

So they’ve dumped seven of them into a pit surrounded by 400 feet of reinforced fence at the lab at the old nuclear weapons complex. The snakes have radio transmitters and data records to monitor their condition.

Scientists think the snakes spread from pet shop terrariums shattered by Hurricane Andrew in Florida in 1992.

They want to know just how far they might spread.

University of Georgia ecology professor Whit Gibbons says pythons compete with major predators, including alligators. He says they have been known to eat people in their native Southeast Asia.

The snakes have been implanted with radio transmitters and thermometers.

Over the next year, scientists will track the reptiles, which can grow over 20 feet long, an see if they survive the Carolina winter.

And if they do?

The test could show whether the giant imported snakes, which can grow up to lengths of 25 feet, are able to spread throughout the Southeast.

The fast-growing population of snakes has been invading southern Florida’s ecosystem since 1992, when scientists speculate a bevy of Burmese pythons was released into the wild after Hurricane Andrew shattered many pet shop terrariums.

Now scientists fear this invasive species is silently slithering northward.