Posted on 02/12/2023 5:18:43 PM PST by Hojczyk
https://www.foxnews.com/us/south-florida-researchers-gps-fitted-possums-raccoons-capture-invasive-pythons-reports
The Tampa Bay Times reported that a group of researchers has been watching raccoon and possum behavior on the edges of Crocodile National Wildlife Refuge, located nearly 40 miles south of Miami in Key Largo.
Though it took a month for the researchers to locate the tracker as the snake moved in and out of Key Largo’s labyrinth of caves, when they did, they found a 12-foot-long, 66-pound female python full of egg follicles. Such a snake has the potential of laying 100 eggs, and capturing one and removing it from the ecosystem can prevent hundreds of future snakes from being introduced into the ecosystem.
After euthanizing the snake, the Times reported, researchers were able to open the snake up and retrieve the collar so that it could be placed on another possum at a later date.
Researchers found that the collars outfitted on small mammals gives them a new way to track Burmese pythons, which are from Southeast Asia and were introduced into the Everglades in the 1990s.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
I figure if they keep potential criminals away, even better. LOL
Woohoo! Box of possums!!
And they get a bad rap as rabies carriers. I’ve read that they can’t get, much less carry, rabies because their body temperature (or similar) doesn’t allow that.
watch out for raccoons- them things are very unpredictable- they will act all friendly like- then for no reason chomp a finger off-
Us people too.
Them I usually don’t open the door for - they’re actually pretty skittish - the ones that regularly come to the deck.
After the party of five, I’ve seen two hissing at two others over the bread.
I DID open the door (just a tiny bit) and tell those guys to get lost - they must share ;)
there’s videos of people approaching what they think are tame acting or gentle acting raccoons- and gettign bit for their efforts-
There is a video of a dude who feeds em every night- and they crawl all over him- but he’s really taking a chance-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ofp26_oc4CA
Pulled up to an ATM one night (in the car obviously). This was about 12 years ago.
This raccoon dude was eating a sandwich right next to the ATM. He gave me one SERIOUS look. I rolled down the window just enough to get my cash.
He DID NOT want me taking his sandwich. And he let me know there was gonna be a fight if I tried.
lol- they do get possessive- -
one night i was on deck having a cigg, close to a spot where we throw our leftovers if we didn’t eat them up in time=- and all of a sudden i heard this weird sound, sounded like a bear huffing- then it changed- sounded like a bobcat- then another sound like chimps- then another sorta like mountain lion - I looked up ‘raccoons fighting’ on youtube- and lo and behold, they made nearly the same sounds-
Now i know what they sound like fighting- but wow, if i had been walking out of the woods after dark, after hunting, and heard that sound without knowing what it was, I’da been some freaked out- especially when it sounded like a bear and cougar-
I could hear them through the screen door - THICK glass
here’s a few of the sounds i heard- this first one has sounds almost like a cougar- its a longer video- but it captured soem of the sounds i heard - like the guy in video said “This is terrifying”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5OQnqPVLBc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jK3fg9EzMfo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZceGsjkd1Lk
This last one it sounds like monkeys, or wild pigs or soemthing- very weird sounds-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cB1q_li9bCE
It’s OK as long as they don’t use cute little bunny wabbits.
They can carry a microbe that causes EPM in horses.
Only about 60 percent of horses fully recover from this.
The medicine is expensive and recover is fairly slow.
My wife doesn’t like possums.
Sounds nasty.
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