Possums with GPS collars use a brand-new method to eliminate Florida pythons

FORT LAUDERDALE — Wildlife scientists studying mammals in Key Largo have actually found a possibly cutting-edge — if not heartbreaking — method to find and eliminate intrusive Burmese pythons, specifically the huge ones.

A group observing raccoon and possum habits along metropolitan and wilderness fringe of Crocodile National Wildlife Refuge fitted lots of the mammals with GPS collars, and tracked their areas for months.

In September, about 5 months into the research study, among the possum collars sent a death signal, activated by absence of motion — perhaps it was struck by a car, perhaps a regional dog killed it. But then, a couple of hours later on, the collar began moving once again.

The scientists had an inkling that the possum suffered a harsh fate.

“That’s the signature signal that they got eaten by a snake,” said Michael Cove, manager of mammals at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, among the partners on the research study. He and his research study partners from the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service and Southern Illinois University believed the snake relaxed and absorbed the possum, and after that began moving once again.

But even with the tracker, it would take them time to validate their inkling — Key Largo is basically a huge fossilized reef with a maze of underground pockets and caverns. “This thing was underground. It took a month of tracking the snake underground (to capture it).”

When they lastly tugged it out of the ground, they found a 12-foot-long, 66-pound female filled with egg roots. Large women like this can lay near to 100 eggs, and are the holy grail for python hunters. Removing them from the environment resembles eliminating lots, if not hundreds, of future snakes. The group euthanized her, opened her up and obtained the collar, which they wish to fit onto another possum quickly.

Though the possum’s death was grim — pythons coil around their victim, tightening up the grip each time the animal breathes out, ultimately suffocating it — the death showed that wildlife authorities can discover huge pythons by tracking their victim.

Cove and his research study partners hope the technique can help manage the explosive population development of the intrusive snake, which has actually annihilated communities in South Florida for years. Indigenous to southeast Asia, Burmese pythons most likely wriggled their method into the Everglades in the 1990s by means of the unique family pet trade.

They’ve prospered, developing breeding populations as far south as Key Largo and as far north at the Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge in western Palm Beach County.

Cove said that the issue is so extreme in Everglades National Park that “there are no more mammals to put these collars on.” The biggest intrusive python ever tape-recorded in Florida was 18 feet long.

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Proof of principle, and a problem

The research study took place on the limit in between the human world and wilderness, and took a look at what occurs when raccoons and possums are “dumpster diving and eating all the cat food that people put out for them instead of eating the native seeds and fruits,” Cove said.

Both types take in a great deal of native fruits and defecate the seeds out in various locations, ending up being essential seed dispersers.

A parallel objective, however, was to find out more about pythons if the mammals were consumed.

“If we could catch a snake in the act, it could lead to management and removal of the pythons,” Cove said.

The very first possum was evidence of principle — the collar endured the crush of the snake, and the snake didn’t pass the collar, offering the researchers time to discover it.

Two weeks earlier, a 2nd collar stopped moving, then began once again, suggesting that a huge raccoon had actually been consumed by a snake. This time they discovered the snake faster: prize, a 77-pound leviathan likewise filled with egg roots.

On Wednesday, yet another collar released a death signal and began moving once again. But by the time scientists reached the tracker, all they discovered was a collar in a stack of snake poop; the python had actually passed the gadget.

“This was really crushing to me that we didn’t pull out this giant monster snake that ate this latest opossum,” Cove said. They now understand that there’s a sense of seriousness, specifically if the snake is big enough to pass the collar.

Of the 43 collars they’ve released, they understand 3 were consumed by pythons, however 6 more have actually merely vanished. The research study group now questions if they were taken in by pythons who then moved beyond the research study’s geographical variety.

Cruel or vital?

Is tracking victim to discover pythons identical to utilizing innocent raccoons and possums as bait?

“That’s a question we’re getting — don’t you feel guilty for putting these animals at risk?” Cove said.

He said the collared animals are not at higher threat, they tackle their business as they generally would, and scientists guarantee the collars don’t impede their motions. Unfortunately the pythons often obstruct them.

“We’re not doing anything but observing the animals doing their natural thing, and they’re unfortunately getting consumed and it’s leading to these python removals,” he said.

As it stands, nobody has actually developed a reliable method to eliminate intrusive pythons.

Authorities have actually attempted myriad approaches, consisting of tracking them with beagles, holding a python-catching derby called Python Challenge — in 2015’s 10-day difficulty led to 231 snakes killed, a little portion of the “tens of thousands” the U.S. Geological Survey quotes are hiding wild in the state.

Will tracking pythons with their victim get rid of the harmful snakes?

No, however it has a benefit over other approaches that may make it more powerful.

“The beauty of this project is that there are size limitations to the snakes,” Cove said. “These are big racoons and larger male opossums, so big snakes that are taking these — the largest snakes are big females.”

The next action

The research study partners at Crocodile Lake National Wildlife Refuge are presently assembling propositions with stakeholders in South Florida to discover methods to fund and produce more and more affordable collars for more research study.

Cove said scientists are dealing with building collars that are little and light adequate to not restrain the raccoons and possums who use them, however big enough to avoid the huge target snakes from passing them. One concept is to cinch zip ties on the collars so that the plastic tails capture within the snake’s digestion system.

Additionally, if future collars don’t require to track mammal motion, however simply signal death and place, they can be more affordable. Current collars cost $1,500 and work for 2 years. But easier death VHS collars would can be found in at about $200 each.

“If we can make cheaper collars and incorporate drone technology … we could put this out on a much broader scale,” Cove said. “This could be another tool. We need everything that we can find to remove as many pythons as possible.”