Shots In The Dark: A Python's Thanksgiving

Thursday, October 13, 2005

A Python's Thanksgiving

In Miami, police have captured a ten-foot African rock python after it hoovered a turkey on a local turkey farm. (Looks like fun, no? The capturing, not the hoovering.)

CAUGHT: Capt. Al Cruz, head of the Miami-Dade fire-rescue anti-venin unit, keeps his grip on a python that was taken to a nature park.

AL DIAZ/HERALD STAFF

Police quickly named the snake Goblin, in honor of the upcoming holiday. Apparently its disposition matches its name. ''It launches at everything that tries to come near it,'' according to the police officer pictured above.

The moral of the story, Capt. Cruz added, is that pythons "are eating more than they can chew."

While we respect Capt. Cruz for being about the most media-friendly police officer imaginable, we will dispute both the zoology of this statement and the metaphysical truth of it. First, though not a snake expert, I don't think snakes chew. Do they?

Second, the snakes aren't doing anything they're not supposed to. It is, as usual, the humans who are causing the problem, by purchasing snakes they ought not to and then releasing them onto the streets of Miami.

¶ 8:40 AM

Comments:

they bite repeatedly, injecting venom which paralyzes and allows them to constrict and suffocate.

you've been a busy blogger, rb.
haven't been here in a few days and wow.
you've got a bazillion posts.

harriet meet goblin! he's grrreat!

# posted by kristen : 10:20 AM

They bite repeatedly...but do they chew?

# posted by richard : 10:29 AM

i believe they then swallow whole.
and i guess the pictures of that alligator bursting out of that python's mid-section support that. don't beat up on the nice officer who caught goblin. he's no Joan Embry, but he is out there assuming an awfully dangerous role.

# posted by kristen : 10:40 AM

I'm not beating up on Captain Cruz! That photo es muy macho.

By the way, I love the stuff about repeated bitings injecting venom which allows them to constrict and suffocate.

Nature is a tough old place....

# posted by richard : 11:28 AM

hssssssssssssss

# posted by kristen : 3:44 PM

One of my buddies in college used to have an albino python, and he was a prime example of someone who shouldn't be allowed to own one. We used to let it out in his den, then he'd let a mouse out in the room. We'd all sit on top of furniture drinking beer, watching the mouse sniff its way around, usually right up to the snake's nose making it too easy. No matter how prepared, I always jumped when he struck--lightning fast. Then we'd have to leave the room because they don't like you to watch while they're just starting to digest. It can make them toss it up and retreat, something I'm glad I never saw.

# posted by Mitch : 7:21 PM

thanks. mitch. that's a heartwarming little story.

# posted by kristen : 9:20 PM

Mitch—I shouldn't be laughing, but I am....

# posted by richard : 8:58 AM

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