Posted on 07/01/2009 10:45:06 AM PDT by cyn
OXFORD, Fla. -- A two-year-old girl was strangled by a python at her family's home in Oxford.
It is unknown whether the snake was a pet and how the child came in contact with the animal.
Pythons can kill by wrapping themselves around a human.
Whit Gibbons, a professor of ecology at the University of Georgia, told the Associated Press that "A human is just another prey item to a python -- especially a small human.
"A 20-foot python, if it grabbed one of us, would bite us and then within just, instantly, seconds, it would be wrapped all the way around you and squeezing the life out of you," Gibbons said.
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission have responded to the scene and are investigating the child's death.
Oxford is northwest of Leesburg.
and pit bulls
a now grieving mom.
this is such a shame! Obviously pet vs escaped into the wild doesn’t matter, either will attack what it perceives as suitable prey.
The python is one of two snakes in the home — the other is a 6-foot boa constrictor.
Both snakes are alive, Carruthers said.
Two other children also lived there.
http://www.wpbf.com/news/19916569/detail.html
Normal pet owners do not feed other live animals to pets;there is nothing cuddly about something that would eat you given the chance.
People who keep snakes,big cats ,and other such pets are doing the equivalent of playing with loaded guns.Sooner or later there will be a tragedy,as the exotice pet kills the neighbor's lapdog or kills its own .foolish owner.
Picture of insanity;snakes don’t belong in church,either.
An exhibit at park has all the venomous snakes stuffed. Which is actually more effective as a teaching tool, since it takes away most of the squeamish factor that keeps people from looking at them.
Thank God for that. Oxford, a few miles west of The Villages retirement community is in North Central Florida, about a dozen miles from me. Glad they haven't slithered up this way yet!
And the children's mother should have taken her children to a safer place,so she ought be prosecuted as well.
Your argument could also be made for less dangerous exotics, like pet fish, which have invaded many areas of the US. Carp and snakehead fish are decimating local native populations.
Also, historically, the population of wild hogs on the continental US is due in part to the original 13 pigs brought over by the Spanish in the 16th and 17th Centuries. Now they number in the millions and are legally considered pests in many states.
I'd like to see that video on the Discovery Channel.
I second that! Here’s another ill-chosen PET KILLS owner story:
http://www.anapsid.org/nyburm.html
According to the New York Times, 19-year old Grant Williams of 365 East 183rd Street Bronx died as the result of an attack by his 13 foot long Burmese Python which may have mistaken him as food.
Sounds like the python solved that dilema.
The above death was in NYC in 1996
Another was in CO in 1993: http://www.anapsid.org/coloburm.html
“The recent Colorado case of a human death caused by a Burmese python (Python molurus bivittatus; 20 July 1993) ...
he victim was a 15-year-old male, 152 cm [5’] tall, weighing 43 kg [95lb]. (details of injuries found at autopsy: both numerous tooth impressions and evidence of strangulation)
“The snake was 336 cm [11’2”] total length, and weighed 24 kg [53lb]. Incidentally, almost all estimates of the snake’s weight presented by the media were above 27 kg and ranged as high as 54 kg. The only accurate weight had been recorded by Officer Steven Paxton soon after the fatality, but few news writers quoted him, preferring to use the larger, exaggerated numbers. ...
“Perhaps the most significant point to emerge from this Colorado case is the fact that a 24kg python, modest in size by comparison with full grown specimens of this and several other species, was able to kill a healthy 43kg adolescent human. This will come as no surprise to experienced herpetologists, but it might be startling to people who have grown unjustifiably complacent with their now mature pythons that have been raised since hatching.”
(hey, nothing new about that, I about die laughing every time I watch their best stuff! who can replace him?)
40+ miles South of Ocala, about 10 miles south of Lady Lake.
It’s also in Virginia about 35 miles straight west and a bit north of Washington DC.
What about on a plane?
awesome photos, some are posted on the other FR thread linked at post 2.
here’s something else I came across while looking for previous US deaths from pythons. it carries “Graphic, not for squeamish” tag:
http://home.att.net/~crinaustin/Snake1.htm
God created pythons, Col. Colt made them equal.
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