Hide and Seek   
      Part 2 of 3

   The Everglades is a subtropical wetland, 100 miles north to south, and 50 miles east to west. Water flows to the sea through saw grass, pine trees, limestone islands, cypress swamps and mangrove forests. 

   There are state and federal lands, private developers' land, Indian lands and farms, all requiring diplomacy for snake hunters. 

   Bird hunters, developers and farmers have done their share of damage to the glades. Pythons are just the latest environmental nightmare. It's not their fault, but they must be contained. 

   By following sentinel males, like Elvis, agents find breeding females and remove them (up to 100 eggs per snake). Other sentinels include Severus, Shrek, Quatro, Stan Lee, Harriet (a female), Luther and Ender. 

   A scientist told a Smithsonian reporter about the time they found a "breeding ball." He said, "We were catching snakes so fast, each of us had one in each hand, and I was standing on others so they couldn't get away." 

   At a conservatory, a veterinarian euthanizes a snake with a drug approved by the American Veterinary Assn. The snake goes into a freezer for future study, and later is incinerated so that no animal ingests the chemicals. 

   Some 12,500 pounds of pythons have ended up there over six years, all caught within 55 square miles of Naples. They calculate that these snakes had dined on 12-1/2 tons of animals and birds. 

   The total ecosystem is about 5,000 square miles. Do the math. 

   Scientists have seen pythons so fat that they wobble along the ground. Then again, they can go a year without eating. (No Nutrisystem necessary.) 

   Undigested "food" includes alligator claws, bird feathers, snails, bobcat claws, deer hooves and other snakes. 
 

Tomorrow: Woman catches 140 pythons

       Jimmy