Latest / Stuff You Should Know / Python-a-palooza!
Transcript
- 0:01Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of I
- 0:04Speaker 1: Heart Radio. Hey you, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh.
- 0:13Speaker 1: There's Chuck, and this is Stuff you should Know about pythons.
- 0:19Speaker 1: Take it, Chuck, You mean take my two pythons to
- 0:24Speaker 1: the vet because I have two sick pythons. Do you
- 0:27Speaker 1: have two sick pythons? You never heard that joke? No,
- 0:32Speaker 1: but muscles? No, let's here. Well, I mean that's just
- 0:35Speaker 1: kind of it. It's just a not just way to
- 0:37Speaker 1: say you have big biceps, so you like, I need
- 0:40Speaker 1: a vet because I've got two sick pythons. Oh no,
- 0:43Speaker 1: I've never heard anything like that. I don't think that
- 0:45Speaker 1: joke even made it into The Hangover. It's like two
- 0:49Speaker 1: tickets to the gun show. Yeah, I've heard that one.
- 0:52Speaker 1: You haven't heard two sick pythons. No, no, No, that's terrible.
- 0:56Speaker 1: I think it was in The Hangover too. Oh I
- 0:58Speaker 1: never saw that one. It was not good. Was the
- 1:02Speaker 1: first one good? Yeah? It was. In fact, I just
- 1:05Speaker 1: watched some of that recently on a plane flight because
- 1:08Speaker 1: I just needed some comfort food and that movie was
- 1:11Speaker 1: really really funny. No, yeah, did you see it? Yeah? Oh, dude,
- 1:18Speaker 1: Zach Alifanakos was great. Ed Helms was great. Ken Uh,
- 1:22Speaker 1: what's his name? Ken Burns was awesome. No, main guy Ken,
- 1:29Speaker 1: the guy who's the doctor in real life, the Asian actor.
- 1:32Speaker 1: Oh Ken Jung, yeah Jung. He was hysterical. Yeah, he's funny. Okay,
- 1:40Speaker 1: Mike Tyson so funny. Tyson was funny that you know.
- 1:44Speaker 1: Actually he wasn't that good in it? Now, never mind,
- 1:46Speaker 1: I'm not gonna talk about that. Okay, correction wrong. I'll
- 1:51Speaker 1: let everyone guess who I didn't think was good out
- 1:53Speaker 1: of all the remaining characters. Oh, man, you're so hard
- 1:56Speaker 1: on that guy. Why what did you don't even know
- 1:58Speaker 1: what I'm talking about? I do too, of course I
- 2:01Speaker 1: know who you're talking about. Should we talk about pythons?
- 2:06Speaker 1: I think we should, And we're not talking about the muscles,
- 2:08Speaker 1: as the joke everybody knows goes. No. Instead, we're talking
- 2:12Speaker 1: about snakes, realize, snakes that will mess you up. Yeah.
- 2:17Speaker 1: I'm not so scared of pythons, no, uh, largely because
- 2:21Speaker 1: I'm never around them. But there's something my snake fear.
- 2:25Speaker 1: And I don't have that much of a snake fear,
- 2:27Speaker 1: but uh, my snake fears around having bangs of a
- 2:32Speaker 1: snake enter my body. But pythons are you know, they
- 2:36Speaker 1: have been known to kill people every once a while.
- 2:38Speaker 1: But from what I read, get this, chuck every single
- 2:41Speaker 1: person that's ever been killed in the United States by
- 2:44Speaker 1: a python, and take that with a grain of salt,
- 2:47Speaker 1: because they're not native to the United States. Um was
- 2:50Speaker 1: a cap was was it killed by their own by
- 2:53Speaker 1: a captive python? Usually it was their pet, and they
- 2:58Speaker 1: messed up by not fall following the proper procedures for
- 3:01Speaker 1: feeding it right, or they like went to sleep with
- 3:05Speaker 1: it wrapped around their neck yau they thought it was comforting,
- 3:07Speaker 1: or sadly they didn't keep their snake in an enclosure
- 3:12Speaker 1: like you're supposed to, and the python got ahold of
- 3:15Speaker 1: a kid in the house. That is, I can't I
- 3:19Speaker 1: can't even like put my mind there. Nightmare. But we
- 3:22Speaker 1: don't want to give python's bad name because UM in
- 3:24Speaker 1: a lot of cases there are definitely um plenty of
- 3:27Speaker 1: them that are pretty docile, nice friendly UM and UM
- 3:31Speaker 1: if they if a python does try to eat you,
- 3:33Speaker 1: it's probably a case of mistaken identity to begin with.
- 3:37Speaker 1: But also there's differences, UM that that make pythons seem
- 3:41Speaker 1: less threatening. They moved just like one mile an hour.
- 3:45Speaker 1: They're very slow. Um, they're not venomous. That's another big one, right, sure, yeah,
- 3:53Speaker 1: I think you know, Andy, I'm scared of any venomous steak,
- 3:57Speaker 1: like really scared of any venomous snake, not like a
- 4:00Speaker 1: phobia or anything. I think that's just like a legitimate fear,
- 4:03Speaker 1: that's right. Uh. They're found in Asia, Africa, and Australia.
- 4:06Speaker 1: They are Old World snakes and there are forty one
- 4:10Speaker 1: species of python. Um, we're going to concentrate on just
- 4:14Speaker 1: a few of these, but these are you know, they
- 4:19Speaker 1: along with the anaconda, which um, maybe we should do
- 4:22Speaker 1: like a shorty on anaconis at some point. But these
- 4:25Speaker 1: are these are the big daddies that are just amazing.
- 4:28Speaker 1: You can you can see a python that's twenty to
- 4:31Speaker 1: thirty ft long, and to see a snake that big
- 4:35Speaker 1: and that heavy, it's just it's it looks like a
- 4:38Speaker 1: holdover from ancient times. Yeah. Um, there are very small
- 4:44Speaker 1: pythons too, though. It turns out there's one called the
- 4:46Speaker 1: antil python. It's only about two feet long and it's
- 4:49Speaker 1: adult size. Um. But for the most part, if you're
- 4:53Speaker 1: talking about pythons. One of the ways to I think
- 4:56Speaker 1: this is probably one of the reasons why they do
- 4:57Speaker 1: seem so impressive too. They're bulk two length ratio is substantial,
- 5:03Speaker 1: which means they're like pretty big around. Even though they're
- 5:07Speaker 1: really long, they're also really big around. Um. So when
- 5:10Speaker 1: you see a snake like that, like, it definitely stands
- 5:13Speaker 1: out in your mind. Yeah. And even among big ones,
- 5:16Speaker 1: there's not the same um, the same color pattern or
- 5:21Speaker 1: anything there. They can really really differ depending on where
- 5:23Speaker 1: they are and what they need to camouflage themselves. Sometimes
- 5:27Speaker 1: you see those really pretty pattern scales that look almost
- 5:31Speaker 1: like a copper head in some ways. Uh. Sometimes they're
- 5:34Speaker 1: solid though. You've seen those big, gigantic bright green ones
- 5:38Speaker 1: or brown ones that are solid brown. Yeah, yeah, really
- 5:40Speaker 1: good looking snakes. Yeah, that's the green tree python, right,
- 5:44Speaker 1: that's right. Um. One thing I found, Chuck that I
- 5:47Speaker 1: found totally fascinating is um. A lot of python species
- 5:51Speaker 1: eat warm blooded um pray. Right. Yes, So they've developed
- 5:57Speaker 1: what are called labial pits, which are these little heat
- 6:00Speaker 1: sensing organs in their face around their mouth. Um, and
- 6:05Speaker 1: it allows them to sense uh. It's basically like the
- 6:08Speaker 1: predator remember UM, they would switch to what looked like
- 6:12Speaker 1: like thermal imaging. That's what those labial pits pick up.
- 6:16Speaker 1: But these UM snakes still also see visible light too,
- 6:20Speaker 1: so they use their eyes, but that the labial pit
- 6:23Speaker 1: information is transferred up their trigeminal nerve through their face
- 6:27Speaker 1: and eventually hits like their optics the optics center in
- 6:30Speaker 1: their brain. So and this is really tough to wrap
- 6:33Speaker 1: your head around. UM, but the the thermal imaging from
- 6:37Speaker 1: the labial pits and the visible information from their eyes
- 6:42Speaker 1: is superimposed so that they see in a way that
- 6:46Speaker 1: UM at this one site put It's impossible for us
- 6:49Speaker 1: to imagine. Isn't that awesome unless you've seen the movie Predator?
- 6:53Speaker 1: And that the um labial pits are so sensitive they
- 6:56Speaker 1: can detect changes in temperature of as little as point
- 7:01Speaker 1: zero zero one degree celsius. It's amazing, I think so too.
- 7:05Speaker 1: Good luck if you're a rabbit, I know you don't
- 7:09Speaker 1: stay in a chance. Sadly, no none, because if you
- 7:13Speaker 1: do get a python around a rabbit, they will grab
- 7:16Speaker 1: ahold of it with its triangular shaped head and they
- 7:19Speaker 1: have these sharp backward curving teeth. If you ever looked
- 7:22Speaker 1: at a Um, if you just look up pictures of
- 7:25Speaker 1: python teeth, they have a lot of sharp fangs that
- 7:29Speaker 1: are kind of pointing in the backwards direction. They don't
- 7:32Speaker 1: because they're not venomous. They don't have those two giant,
- 7:35Speaker 1: big daddy venom injectors at the front, which those are
- 7:39Speaker 1: the things that really scare me when it comes to snakes.
- 7:42Speaker 1: So pythons don't have those, but uh, they do, some
- 7:46Speaker 1: of them. Arboreal pythons have these prehensible tails that, um,
- 7:51Speaker 1: you know, there are legends of pythons like leaping from
- 7:54Speaker 1: trees to kill people or kill prey. That is not
- 7:58Speaker 1: true because that would hurt the snake to eat from
- 8:00Speaker 1: a tree. But they said in the articles I read,
- 8:03Speaker 1: they're like, well, they don't do that, but so don't worry.
- 8:06Speaker 1: But but they can really hang from the tree and
- 8:08Speaker 1: then come down and grab you. Right. They're famous for
- 8:11Speaker 1: wearing a hat and swinging down in front of your
- 8:13Speaker 1: face and going hello yeah. Basically, um, So there's some
- 8:19Speaker 1: other things about pythons that um stand out even amongst snakes.
- 8:23Speaker 1: One of the things that they have that most snakes
- 8:25Speaker 1: don't is two lungs, which is weird because it makes
- 8:29Speaker 1: them primitive. Then that seems odd we have two long
- 8:33Speaker 1: as we'd think, well, it's evolving towards humanity. Of course,
- 8:35Speaker 1: that's that's not primitive, that's the opposite. But apparently, um,
- 8:40Speaker 1: all snakes, or at least pythons I should say, evolved
- 8:44Speaker 1: from four legged, uh two long vertebrates of some sort
- 8:49Speaker 1: in the great distant past, and they just haven't evolved
- 8:53Speaker 1: into just a single lung like plenty of other snake
- 8:56Speaker 1: families have. That's right. And because of that evolution, they
- 8:59Speaker 1: all so have remnants of that stuff. They have remnants
- 9:02Speaker 1: of a pelvis and these little hind limbs and they're
- 9:06Speaker 1: called spurs located on the back, on the sides beside
- 9:10Speaker 1: the cloaca, and they use those for a bunch of
- 9:12Speaker 1: different things. But one of the things they do, and
- 9:14Speaker 1: we'll talk a little bit more about mating, they'll kind
- 9:17Speaker 1: of kind of stroke the ladies with the what's what's
- 9:22Speaker 1: left over of their vestigial limbs? I like that? Does
- 9:26Speaker 1: that creep you out? Yes? It does? It seems very sweet. So, um,
- 9:33Speaker 1: if you wanted to find a python in the wild, chuck,
- 9:36Speaker 1: where would you go? Well, already said Asia, Africa and Australia.
- 9:41Speaker 1: But what parts of those continents you would go to
- 9:45Speaker 1: where it's warm and wet. You would go maybe to
- 9:48Speaker 1: a rainforest, maybe in the woodlands or grasslands or the swamps.
- 9:53Speaker 1: They like to hide in under rocks and things. They
- 9:57Speaker 1: like to hide in little animal burrows. Like I said,
- 10:00Speaker 1: they can't hang from tree branches. Uh, this should scare everyone,
- 10:05Speaker 1: and we'll get a little bit more into how they've
- 10:07Speaker 1: made their way to Florida in the United States. But
- 10:10Speaker 1: when they are found in urban areas, they shelter in
- 10:14Speaker 1: urban debris. So you could, uh, you could pick up
- 10:17Speaker 1: a spare tire or turn over a wheelbarrow and find
- 10:20Speaker 1: a python into there. And if you were in the
- 10:22Speaker 1: in the wrong place at the wrong time, somewhere in
- 10:24Speaker 1: Florida right in the inner cities are littered with overturned wheelbarrows,
- 10:31Speaker 1: well you never know. So remember I said that python's
- 10:36Speaker 1: moved about one mile an hour. There's a reason for this.
- 10:39Speaker 1: That's really slow, just if you stop and think about it.
- 10:42Speaker 1: The reason they are so slow is because they're using
- 10:45Speaker 1: a form of movement called rectilinear progression um, which is
- 10:49Speaker 1: where they brace themselves on the ground with their ribs
- 10:54Speaker 1: and then lift their body up a little bit in
- 10:57Speaker 1: front and then push themselves forward and then just keep
- 11:00Speaker 1: repeating this. It's just kind of like, um uh, like
- 11:04Speaker 1: herky jerky moving forward in a herky jerky motion. Yeah.
- 11:09Speaker 1: I was looking at python movement and it looked like
- 11:12Speaker 1: a slither to me. It didn't stand out as much
- 11:16Speaker 1: as I thought it. What is looking really different? I
- 11:18Speaker 1: guess I should say, well, that's how they fool you. Well,
- 11:21Speaker 1: I guess so. I mean, they were definitely slow, but
- 11:24Speaker 1: I think I expected a lot more of a straight line,
- 11:28Speaker 1: and they do go in a straight line like as
- 11:29Speaker 1: opposed to like a really big S shaped slither. But
- 11:33Speaker 1: there was still some slither to their diather, you know
- 11:36Speaker 1: what I'm saying. Sure, I mean they are snakes after all.
- 11:39Speaker 1: To um they're also like frequently you can find them
- 11:44Speaker 1: in water. Apparently pythons can stay submerged in water for
- 11:48Speaker 1: up to half an hour. And one of the ways
- 11:50Speaker 1: that they they hunt is by basically hanging out in
- 11:55Speaker 1: water and waiting for something to come over to get
- 11:57Speaker 1: a little drinking and copal. And they're a will to
- 12:00Speaker 1: do this because they're um. Their their skin tones really
- 12:05Speaker 1: camouflaged well with like muddy mucky bottom. So it's really
- 12:09Speaker 1: tough to see a python, especially a Burmese python. Yeah,
- 12:13Speaker 1: there was a lot of alligators similarity. Uh, it's interesting
- 12:17Speaker 1: when I was studying this stuff. Hey, yeah, that hadn't
- 12:20Speaker 1: stuck out to me. But absolutely you're right, including how
- 12:23Speaker 1: to get away from him, which we'll get to, um,
- 12:25Speaker 1: But maybe we should take a break and we'll come
- 12:27Speaker 1: back and talk a little bit about uh they're hunting
- 12:30Speaker 1: and feeding and more detail right after this. Y yea,
- 13:02Speaker 1: so chok, we're talking about their hunting and feeding habits
- 13:05Speaker 1: and um. Like I said, they they sometimes hang out
- 13:08Speaker 1: underwater waiting for something to come up. They might also
- 13:12Speaker 1: just be hanging out on a tree branch. They might
- 13:14Speaker 1: just be hanging out under some brush. But what they're
- 13:16Speaker 1: doing every time they're hanging out is um performing the
- 13:20Speaker 1: type of hunting they do, which is ambush. They just
- 13:23Speaker 1: wait around for some prey to come and then come bout.
- 13:25Speaker 1: They get your alligators. Yeah, it is, it's like alligators.
- 13:29Speaker 1: You're right, man, Um, Please stop proving your point now.
- 13:34Speaker 1: But that's what they do. They ambush hunt, they bite,
- 13:37Speaker 1: and then they constrict bite and constrict back into the left.
- 13:43Speaker 1: That's right. If you're a little python, like the little
- 13:47Speaker 1: guys that are two or three ft long, you're gonna
- 13:48Speaker 1: eat mice and rats and things like that. Uh, lizards,
- 13:52Speaker 1: Maybe some birds might get in there if they're not
- 13:55Speaker 1: paying attention. If they're bigger, you name it man um, pigs, antelope, monkeys.
- 14:02Speaker 1: I think they found a rock python that had a
- 14:06Speaker 1: leopard in its stomach, A small leopard. Yeah, but that's
- 14:11Speaker 1: that's terrifying. That leopard doesn't win that battle. Well, So
- 14:15Speaker 1: that's something that pythons are known for, and we'll talk
- 14:18Speaker 1: more about it in a second. But they are capable
- 14:21Speaker 1: of eating things that are even bigger than they are,
- 14:24Speaker 1: which doesn't make sense even for snakes, Like that's really crazy.
- 14:28Speaker 1: Some of the stuff that they've eaten. Um. I saw
- 14:31Speaker 1: a picture, it's a really sad, terrible picture of a
- 14:34Speaker 1: python that tried to eat an alligator and it was
- 14:37Speaker 1: too big, and the python actually burst into in half
- 14:41Speaker 1: and the alligator was spilled out. But they are willing
- 14:45Speaker 1: to eat really large things because their body actually changes
- 14:49Speaker 1: to accommodate this huge um load of food that they've
- 14:54Speaker 1: just now taken on. It's got too big for a
- 14:57Speaker 1: stomach exactly, and now the body's like, now I gotta
- 15:01Speaker 1: change in adjust because this guy doesn't know his own size.
- 15:05Speaker 1: So you mentioned constriction. They are constrictors, and we'll talk
- 15:08Speaker 1: a little bit about how what they have in common
- 15:10Speaker 1: with BoA's a little bit later. But I think for many,
- 15:14Speaker 1: many years they thought that, um, well, they thought a
- 15:18Speaker 1: few things. Constriction. At first they thought was like they
- 15:20Speaker 1: were crushing their prey and like breaking their bones. That's
- 15:23Speaker 1: not true. Uh. Then for a while they thought that
- 15:26Speaker 1: they suffocated their prey and just like tightened up on
- 15:29Speaker 1: the lung so much that you can't breathe. That makes sense.
- 15:32Speaker 1: All of this sort of makes sense. But in two
- 15:34Speaker 1: thousand fifteen, uh, there was a scientific paper that came
- 15:37Speaker 1: out that basically said, hey, with boa constrictors, we now
- 15:42Speaker 1: know that what they do is they they don't suffocate you.
- 15:45Speaker 1: What they do is they cut off your brain or
- 15:48Speaker 1: your blood circulation basically, so you don't get any blood
- 15:51Speaker 1: to your brain and that's how you die. So it
- 15:54Speaker 1: may be true for pythons as well, because they are
- 15:56Speaker 1: also constrictors. Obviously, yeah, it would make a lot of sense. Um,
- 16:00Speaker 1: And that actually makes even more sense than than preventing
- 16:03Speaker 1: you from breathing, because you would lose consciousness much faster
- 16:06Speaker 1: if they can cut off the blood supply to your brain,
- 16:09Speaker 1: which is what you want to happen, because when they
- 16:12Speaker 1: when they capture you by biting your head like you're
- 16:16Speaker 1: eating head first by a python, you would probably hope,
- 16:20Speaker 1: no matter whether you're a person or a buddy, that
- 16:23Speaker 1: you have lost consciousness by the time it starts to
- 16:25Speaker 1: swallow you head first. Yeah. I saw a video of
- 16:31Speaker 1: someone feeding a dead bunny to this python on a
- 16:36Speaker 1: porch and it was, you know, it's just it was
- 16:42Speaker 1: it's just not fun to watch. I mean's super interesting,
- 16:46Speaker 1: but uh and again it wasn't a lie bunny. But
- 16:49Speaker 1: you know, when you when you see an animal consuming,
- 16:51Speaker 1: like unhinging that jaw and working this bunny's body into
- 16:54Speaker 1: its mouth, it's just it's amazing in a nature sense.
- 16:58Speaker 1: But I didn't watch at all, let's put it that way.
- 17:01Speaker 1: I don't blame you, so, Chuck, I think we should
- 17:05Speaker 1: talk about the studies of trying to figure out how
- 17:09Speaker 1: pythons can eat things that are so much bigger than it,
- 17:13Speaker 1: or just so enormous to begin with, not necessarily even
- 17:17Speaker 1: bigger than the snake, but way bigger than anything you
- 17:21Speaker 1: or I could eat proportionately, right, that's right. And they've
- 17:25Speaker 1: figured out thanks to um genetic sequencing, they see they
- 17:30Speaker 1: sequence the genome of the Burmese python um and found
- 17:35Speaker 1: out that it's actually their genes changed. The way that
- 17:39Speaker 1: their genes express um things like proteins or affect their metabolism.
- 17:45Speaker 1: All this stuff actually changes when they eat, and it
- 17:48Speaker 1: happens really fast, and the changes that it creates are
- 17:52Speaker 1: really really dramatic. Yeah, I mean the fact that this
- 17:56Speaker 1: was naturally selected over I mean they think that happenedically
- 18:00Speaker 1: as well, right, yeah, yeah, like the that during its
- 18:03Speaker 1: evolution it started picking up these these positive adaptations like
- 18:07Speaker 1: really fast. And the main thing they found out that
- 18:09Speaker 1: it was allows pythons to eat things that are as
- 18:11Speaker 1: big as they are is their their organs shrink when
- 18:14Speaker 1: they're eating to to make room in there, like their
- 18:17Speaker 1: liver and their kidneys and their intestines. They act in
- 18:21Speaker 1: their heart even get smaller while they're eating these things
- 18:24Speaker 1: to create space. And after like some of these things,
- 18:27Speaker 1: I think the liver actually doubles in mass in the
- 18:30Speaker 1: two days after they're done eating. Yeah, their heart actually
- 18:33Speaker 1: increases in size by about in the two days after
- 18:38Speaker 1: they eat, which is like that that is very unusual,
- 18:43Speaker 1: but it actually has to happen because the metabolism that's
- 18:47Speaker 1: required to eat this huge thing, because we didn't I
- 18:50Speaker 1: don't know if we said, like they'll go like a
- 18:52Speaker 1: week without eating, they'll eat once a week. So the
- 18:55Speaker 1: rest of the time they're their metabolism is just going
- 18:57Speaker 1: along doing whatever. Then all of a sudden it's presented
- 19:00Speaker 1: with this huge piece of food that it needs to digest.
- 19:03Speaker 1: So it's a huge increase in metabolic demand, and the
- 19:06Speaker 1: heart actually increases in size to accommodate that increase in
- 19:10Speaker 1: metabolic demand. It's amazing, it really is. And they figured
- 19:14Speaker 1: out that it's their genes just become super active and
- 19:18Speaker 1: start producing way more proteins and um just doing all
- 19:21Speaker 1: this stuff that under normal circumstances when they're not digesting
- 19:24Speaker 1: food just doesn't. It's just not how their genes behave.
- 19:29Speaker 1: And if you're wondering how they're breathing with a rabbit
- 19:32Speaker 1: stuff down their throats, they have a windpipe that opens
- 19:36Speaker 1: at the front of the mouth so they can breathe
- 19:37Speaker 1: while they're doing this stuff. Yeah, I saw it described
- 19:40Speaker 1: as kind of popping up like a periscope. Yeah, that's amazing.
- 19:46Speaker 1: So what about reproduction. I know that you really like
- 19:48Speaker 1: how they court. Do you want to talk some more
- 19:51Speaker 1: about that. Yeah. When they make kind of depends on
- 19:54Speaker 1: which species it is. It's not set in stone, but
- 19:57Speaker 1: they do. Those males use those spurs that were originally
- 20:01Speaker 1: limbs to stroke the female, and once they impregnate them,
- 20:06Speaker 1: the ladies they lay eggs. Actually, um, which is another
- 20:10Speaker 1: thing that's different than other boas even is that they
- 20:13Speaker 1: give birth to live young, but pythons give give birth
- 20:18Speaker 1: to little egg Well, I guess big eggs because some
- 20:20Speaker 1: of these things are a couple of feet long when
- 20:22Speaker 1: they come out when they hatch. I saw there about
- 20:24Speaker 1: the size of chicken eggs. Well, how could they be
- 20:27Speaker 1: two ft long? I don't know, crazy, I don't know,
- 20:31Speaker 1: I don't know. I guess maybe they eat themselves while
- 20:33Speaker 1: they're in the egg. Uh. They do provide most of
- 20:39Speaker 1: the time some parental care, and they make little nest
- 20:42Speaker 1: Mama does and keep some warm and like protected spaces
- 20:46Speaker 1: under logs and stuff like that, and you know, sort
- 20:49Speaker 1: of burrowed areas and they coil around them. Um. If
- 20:53Speaker 1: they since temperature changing whatever, the mother will sort of
- 20:58Speaker 1: flex her muscles and sort of can tracked in place
- 21:00Speaker 1: to heat up her own body to warm up the eggs.
- 21:03Speaker 1: That's called shivering thermogenesis. And they're not feeding when this
- 21:08Speaker 1: is going on. They're only leaving their nest if they
- 21:11Speaker 1: want to really warm up, and they call that basking,
- 21:14Speaker 1: just like we do. Yeah, and then the eggs hatch
- 21:16Speaker 1: and the mom says, see you, and that's that um.
- 21:20Speaker 1: And depending on the species, like they they will um
- 21:24Speaker 1: reproduce fairly frequently. I think a female snake um produces
- 21:29Speaker 1: about forty eggs every two years. They start breeding at
- 21:32Speaker 1: about three to four years old, so like they're you know,
- 21:37Speaker 1: a pretty successful family of snakes. They reproduce pretty frequently.
- 21:42Speaker 1: And then I guess because the hatchlings are so big
- 21:44Speaker 1: when they're born, they don't really need to be raised
- 21:47Speaker 1: or nurtured or protected. They're just on their own from
- 21:50Speaker 1: the moment they come out of the egg, and they
- 21:52Speaker 1: can live decades. They can live a long long time,
- 21:56Speaker 1: which is why a lot of snake enthusiasts love him
- 21:59Speaker 1: as pets. I think the San Diego zeus says about
- 22:01Speaker 1: thirty five years, which is that's a long time. Yeah,
- 22:05Speaker 1: that's at the tippy top. So, Chuck, I believe that
- 22:08Speaker 1: we should speak uh at length about the Burmese python
- 22:13Speaker 1: because this is as far as pythons go, it's very
- 22:17Speaker 1: very beautiful snake. It's actually highly prized for its skin.
- 22:20Speaker 1: Sad for the Burmese python, but it also has a
- 22:24Speaker 1: really interesting story here in the United States. That's right. Um.
- 22:30Speaker 1: They have pale tan, sort of gray bodies sometimes yellow brown.
- 22:34Speaker 1: They have these big sort of reddish splotches. Uh. And
- 22:38Speaker 1: they have their sort of um almost like they were
- 22:40Speaker 1: drawn around their outlined in different colors white or yellow usually,
- 22:44Speaker 1: and they are really pretty. And they are in Florida. Um,
- 22:48Speaker 1: just like uh, we were talking about the alligators. There's
- 22:53Speaker 1: I don't I mean, I guess you would call it
- 22:54Speaker 1: a python problem. In one sense, it's it's not as
- 22:57Speaker 1: much of a problem in that they're not really like
- 23:00Speaker 1: coming out of the wild and attacking people really um,
- 23:04Speaker 1: but they're they're make wreaking havoc on the local ecosystem
- 23:07Speaker 1: there as far as mammals go, it's an ecological disaster
- 23:10Speaker 1: as a matter of fact. Like it's if you're in
- 23:13Speaker 1: the Everglades and you care about biodiversity, you you have
- 23:16Speaker 1: a real problem with the Burmese python, which have been
- 23:20Speaker 1: really successful in setting up shop in the Everglades specifically. UM.
- 23:25Speaker 1: But they're an invasive species because they're not supposed to
- 23:28Speaker 1: be there. There haven't been snakes this large native to
- 23:31Speaker 1: the to the America's since long before humans were around.
- 23:36Speaker 1: So they came in and there they have no predators
- 23:39Speaker 1: there themselves, like an apex predator, and um, they've been
- 23:43Speaker 1: eating everything they can get their hands on, basically. And
- 23:47Speaker 1: the crazy thing about this is that they set up
- 23:50Speaker 1: shop in the Everglades because people started releasing them um
- 23:55Speaker 1: as pets. They were pets that got released and abandoned,
- 23:58Speaker 1: and now they're huge problem in Florida. Yeah. And and
- 24:02Speaker 1: not just like oh, you know there's been a decline
- 24:08Speaker 1: in in this roadent or this species. There was a
- 24:11Speaker 1: study and this is in twelve even Uh, the raccoon
- 24:14Speaker 1: population dropped nine three percent, possums almost extinct ninety eight
- 24:20Speaker 1: point nine percent, bobcats eighty seven point five percent, and
- 24:24Speaker 1: this from to two thousand twelve. Uh. And essentially foxes
- 24:29Speaker 1: and and rabbits have all but disappeared in the Everglades. Yeah,
- 24:34Speaker 1: so again that's an ecological catastrophe because not only is
- 24:38Speaker 1: it eating all of these important like um animals, they're
- 24:42Speaker 1: also competing with other larger stuff for food too, so
- 24:46Speaker 1: they're having an effect on like the local alligators and
- 24:48Speaker 1: other like probably the whatever panthers are down there. Um.
- 24:53Speaker 1: So it's a huge problem that they're there, and as
- 24:56Speaker 1: a result they're finding that um that Lord is basically
- 25:00Speaker 1: trying to figure out anything it can do to handle
- 25:03Speaker 1: this stuff. And I read that there's this thing called
- 25:07Speaker 1: the Python Challenge, the Annual Python Challenge, where they basically say, hey,
- 25:12Speaker 1: anybody and everybody who has a gun or a stick
- 25:16Speaker 1: or a knife or whatever you want to use to
- 25:20Speaker 1: kill a python, will give ten thousand dollars to the
- 25:23Speaker 1: person who kills the most pythons this year during this
- 25:26Speaker 1: Python Challenge. That's the level that Florida is at right now,
- 25:29Speaker 1: and it's having almost no effect because there's number one,
- 25:34Speaker 1: so many of them, but also because it is so
- 25:37Speaker 1: hard to see a python, even when you're basically standing
- 25:41Speaker 1: on top of it. It's that good. A Burmese python
- 25:44Speaker 1: is that good at camouflaging itself in the Everglades. Well, yeah,
- 25:48Speaker 1: that in the twenty eggs a year, right, Well that
- 25:51Speaker 1: was another thing to chuck is because the hatchlings are
- 25:54Speaker 1: so big. Do you remember when we talked about alligators
- 25:57Speaker 1: and how their numbers are kept in check because rack
- 26:00Speaker 1: coons will eat their hatchlings. Well, these Burmese pythons hatchlings
- 26:04Speaker 1: are so big. There's nothing in the Everglades that is
- 26:07Speaker 1: going to eat them. So they're incredibly successful at reproducing too.
- 26:12Speaker 1: That's a really good point. I'm trying to imagine something
- 26:15Speaker 1: thirty six inches long coming out of a chicken egg.
- 26:17Speaker 1: I know, even if it was, I guess it would
- 26:20Speaker 1: have to be the width of like a worm. Yeah,
- 26:23Speaker 1: it would be a little bit bigger, it would have
- 26:24Speaker 1: to be thin. But again, pythons are known for their
- 26:27Speaker 1: bulky nous, right, So I don't know. I just saw
- 26:29Speaker 1: I read a I believe it was a Smithsonian article
- 26:33Speaker 1: that was kind of the journalist was embedded with people who,
- 26:36Speaker 1: you know, hunt and track Burmese pythons in the Everglades.
- 26:40Speaker 1: Apparently there's an all women tracking team called the Everglades
- 26:43Speaker 1: Avengers um and like they somebody who knows what they're
- 26:48Speaker 1: talking about, describes it as the size of a chicken egg.
- 26:51Speaker 1: So that's where I got that from. So act if
- 26:54Speaker 1: I'm wrong, they were wrong. They look a little bigger,
- 26:59Speaker 1: but not much bigger. I guess they're just wrapped up.
- 27:03Speaker 1: They must just be really thin and bulk up really fast.
- 27:06Speaker 1: It goes stroying when they come out of their egg.
- 27:09Speaker 1: So you mentioned the Everglades. You're definitely all over the Everglades,
- 27:12Speaker 1: but they're expanding their territory. They're also in Big Cypress
- 27:17Speaker 1: National Preserve. They are in Collier Seminole State Forest. They
- 27:23Speaker 1: have been found in Miami, mh. They have been found
- 27:27Speaker 1: in the Florida Keys, which is means one of two things.
- 27:31Speaker 1: Either someone brought them there and release them there, or
- 27:35Speaker 1: they can tolerate saltwater. They were python swimming in the ocean. Yeah,
- 27:39Speaker 1: apparently that's been documented that they're you know, they're good
- 27:43Speaker 1: swimmers and they comp apparently tolerate saltwater, so it's entirely
- 27:46Speaker 1: possible they swim under the keys. Could you imagine doing
- 27:49Speaker 1: a little ocean swimming and seeing a freaking python. Yeah,
- 27:54Speaker 1: Because I mean these things get big, like in their
- 27:56Speaker 1: native habitat um in Southeast Asia. They it up to
- 28:00Speaker 1: about twenty six and two pounds. Apparently the ones in
- 28:04Speaker 1: Florida usually are average about eight to ten feet, so
- 28:08Speaker 1: that's still a very significant bulky snake that you would
- 28:12Speaker 1: see coming swimming at you while you're waiting in the water,
- 28:15Speaker 1: going how are you? I think those are I think
- 28:20Speaker 1: the ones in Miami those are African pythons are right, yes,
- 28:23Speaker 1: which apparently are almost indistinguishable from Burmese pythons to the
- 28:28Speaker 1: average person. So suburban and urban areas of Miami have pythons. Yeah,
- 28:33Speaker 1: they also have boa constrictors. Apparently there's a big iguana
- 28:37Speaker 1: problem down there as well, all from just jerks releasing
- 28:39Speaker 1: their pets that they don't want any longer because they
- 28:43Speaker 1: there's there's a really big problem with in scrupulous um
- 28:46Speaker 1: snake dealers, backyard breeders, people who actually have storefronts um
- 28:51Speaker 1: even like corporate chain pet stores selling snakes um and
- 28:55Speaker 1: and being like you have to kill a mouse to
- 28:57Speaker 1: feed this thing. Um. There's a lot of like this.
- 29:01Speaker 1: It's not just intuitive how to keep a snake happy
- 29:03Speaker 1: and healthy, and so people get overwhelmed by snakes and
- 29:06Speaker 1: they don't know what to do with them. So if
- 29:08Speaker 1: you're in Florida around Miami. You just release it in
- 29:11Speaker 1: your backyard and say see you later, and the snake
- 29:14Speaker 1: takes off and becomes a problem in the Everglades with
- 29:17Speaker 1: a tear rolling down its cheek. That's right through Pastco
- 29:21Speaker 1: Pasco and don't look back, right, and it turns around
- 29:24Speaker 1: and you have to punch a snake in the face
- 29:26Speaker 1: and go go right. I'd never liked you to begin with. Uh,
- 29:31Speaker 1: I think we need to take a second break, stol Right, yeah,
- 29:34Speaker 1: all right, let's do that, and we'll talk a little
- 29:36Speaker 1: bit more about what you can do if you do
- 29:38Speaker 1: see a python in the wild, and all about pet pythons,
- 29:41Speaker 1: the sweetest kind right after this. All right, we've established
- 30:14Speaker 1: that you're probably not in danger of being attacked by
- 30:17Speaker 1: a python in the wild in the United States. Um,
- 30:22Speaker 1: as far as we know, that has not happened. I
- 30:24Speaker 1: don't even think once. Right, that's my understanding. All right, good,
- 30:28Speaker 1: let's just keep that going. Let's keep that record intact. Uh,
- 30:31Speaker 1: if you do see a python in the wild, if
- 30:33Speaker 1: you're living in Florida, they have apps. Now, they have
- 30:37Speaker 1: hot lines. I've got one is the name of the program.
- 30:41Speaker 1: There's a hot line eight one or smartphone applications. I've
- 30:46Speaker 1: got one. You can just get that app if you
- 30:47Speaker 1: live in the area, and you just report that thing.
- 30:50Speaker 1: If you don't have the app, just go to the
- 30:52Speaker 1: National Park ranger say hey, I saw python over there.
- 30:56Speaker 1: By that time, it's probably way too late. Um, they're
- 30:58Speaker 1: probably out of there, but you should definitely report it
- 31:02Speaker 1: because it's a big, big issue and it's not you know,
- 31:05Speaker 1: I guess it sounds a little awful that they're just saying,
- 31:08Speaker 1: go kill as many as you can for ten thousand bucks.
- 31:10Speaker 1: But it is, like you said, it is wrecking the
- 31:13Speaker 1: ecosystem down there, and that's that's not good for anyone, know,
- 31:17Speaker 1: and the people like it's still sad for the Burmese pythons.
- 31:21Speaker 1: They're just doing their thing. They just happen to be
- 31:23Speaker 1: very successful. It's the people who released them that are
- 31:27Speaker 1: really at fault and deserve everyone's scorn. Sure, but we
- 31:30Speaker 1: should talk about the ball python, which and this is
- 31:32Speaker 1: sort of the uh, the the go to pet. If
- 31:36Speaker 1: you want a constrictor and you don't want to Boa,
- 31:39Speaker 1: you can go with the old ball python. Yeah, they're
- 31:42Speaker 1: a lot more docile, they're much smaller, they grow maybe
- 31:45Speaker 1: to five or six feet. They don't move around much.
- 31:48Speaker 1: They don't they're not super active, so they are as
- 31:52Speaker 1: if you're going to have a snake as a pet,
- 31:54Speaker 1: a ball python is a good way to go for sure. Yeah.
- 31:57Speaker 1: They've got little dark uh stripes a lot times on
- 32:01Speaker 1: their face. You have like through like through their eyes.
- 32:03Speaker 1: It's very pretty, Yeah, very pretty snake. Uh. They have
- 32:06Speaker 1: these again those dark blotches that are outlined in a
- 32:10Speaker 1: lighter color. Very attractive skins. And again it's very sad
- 32:15Speaker 1: that their skins are being used for you know, bipoachers
- 32:19Speaker 1: or whatever to sell. Uh. They there are albino pythons
- 32:24Speaker 1: as well, which has become such a favorite snake that
- 32:28Speaker 1: they're actually breeding this into them. Yeah, they don't have
- 32:33Speaker 1: albini is. Um, they have a melotint ism, a melan
- 32:36Speaker 1: a melan is ism they I think that proves that
- 32:41Speaker 1: doesn't have quite the ring though melanists DoSM whatever. But
- 32:46Speaker 1: one of the there's actually some types of ball pythons
- 32:49Speaker 1: that um, they'll have like a yellow body and then
- 32:52Speaker 1: their stripes are actually lacking in pigments so it looks
- 32:55Speaker 1: like yellow and white. Um. There's ones that have black
- 32:58Speaker 1: stripes but they're lacking pig men in their body, so
- 33:00Speaker 1: it's like this black and white the really gorgeous snakes
- 33:04Speaker 1: for sure. Yes, and like you said, they are docile.
- 33:07Speaker 1: They're good. If you have never even had a snake before,
- 33:10Speaker 1: it could be a good place to start if you've
- 33:12Speaker 1: never if you didn't even know snakes existed. The bald
- 33:15Speaker 1: python is a great place to start. It is. They're
- 33:18Speaker 1: called ball pythons because if they get threatened, they curl
- 33:21Speaker 1: up and roll up in a little ball. It's very cute.
- 33:23Speaker 1: It's very sensible too. So um, if you are going
- 33:27Speaker 1: to buy a snake, you probably do not want a
- 33:30Speaker 1: wild caught ball python because when they're caught, they don't
- 33:34Speaker 1: really want to leave their home in the wilderness and
- 33:37Speaker 1: come to your home, so they're going to be stressed out. Snakes,
- 33:40Speaker 1: like all other captive animals, who get bored and they're
- 33:43Speaker 1: not cared for, can just can um display zookosis and
- 33:48Speaker 1: other terrible habits. Um. So you would probably want to
- 33:51Speaker 1: get one from a breeder or a pet store or
- 33:54Speaker 1: something like that. But again you should consider um you're
- 33:58Speaker 1: taking something out of the wild, even if it wasn't
- 34:00Speaker 1: born in the wild, and keeping it in a little
- 34:02Speaker 1: twenty gallon aquarium in your house. So I think that
- 34:05Speaker 1: part through first. Yeah, and they don't, Um, it's not
- 34:10Speaker 1: mean to keep them in a smaller enclosure. They like
- 34:12Speaker 1: tight spaces, So you don't need to get this huge
- 34:16Speaker 1: thing for your ball python. Um no, you would, that
- 34:19Speaker 1: would be mean, actually is from what Yeah, I mean
- 34:21Speaker 1: they need a little bit of room, but they like
- 34:23Speaker 1: they're not real active again, and they like tight spaces. Uh.
- 34:27Speaker 1: They it has to be really secure because they are
- 34:30Speaker 1: great at getting out of those cages and exploring your apartment.
- 34:35Speaker 1: I think one of the reasons we talked about their lifespan.
- 34:38Speaker 1: I think one of the reasons people um release them
- 34:41Speaker 1: sometimes is even though they know this getting into it,
- 34:44Speaker 1: it's hard to make a thirty year commitment to something.
- 34:48Speaker 1: So if you're you know, if you're some forty to
- 34:51Speaker 1: fifty year old dude and you're like get into snakes
- 34:54Speaker 1: all of a sudden, you're not thinking about what's going
- 34:56Speaker 1: to be going on when you're eighty, Uh, you might
- 35:00Speaker 1: us away, your family may not know what to do
- 35:02Speaker 1: with it, and release it. So this is a long
- 35:04Speaker 1: term commitment that you really really need to think through,
- 35:07Speaker 1: right if you're going to do this, Let's say you're
- 35:09Speaker 1: under the age of fifty and you're like, I'm into
- 35:11Speaker 1: snakes now, Um, there are some things you want to do. Um.
- 35:14Speaker 1: You want to keep your snake nice and warm. Uh.
- 35:17Speaker 1: And in fact, you want to have basically dual climate
- 35:20Speaker 1: zones in your twenty gallon or thirty gallon aquarium, depending
- 35:23Speaker 1: on the size of the snake. Um. You want to
- 35:25Speaker 1: keep it somewhere in the neighborhood of seventy eight degrees
- 35:29Speaker 1: in the in the tank in general. And then you
- 35:32Speaker 1: want to fahrenheit thank you, Celsie's I think would melt
- 35:35Speaker 1: the snake. Um. And then you want to keep a
- 35:38Speaker 1: little area for basking even hotter. Remember you talked about
- 35:42Speaker 1: how snakes like to bask. Um this one. This is
- 35:45Speaker 1: going to be more like eight eight to ninety two
- 35:48Speaker 1: degrees fahrenheight, so the snake can be like, I'm gonna
- 35:50Speaker 1: go warm up over here on my nice little rock.
- 35:53Speaker 1: And Um. If you do that and you keep track
- 35:56Speaker 1: of your temperatures, like you have to really make sure
- 35:58Speaker 1: it stays like this, then it will be much happier
- 36:01Speaker 1: than otherwise. Yeah, but you want to screen those lights off.
- 36:04Speaker 1: You don't want it actually touching the bulb because that
- 36:07Speaker 1: can burn their little skin. And there was one of
- 36:10Speaker 1: the thing that um they really love is as branches.
- 36:14Speaker 1: They love to hang on tree branches. So if you
- 36:16Speaker 1: could outfit your aquarium, it's got to be sturdy. Don't
- 36:19Speaker 1: just put like some sort of lightweight limb from your yard.
- 36:22Speaker 1: But if you can affix like a really sturdy limb
- 36:24Speaker 1: in your your python cage, they're gonna be pretty happy
- 36:27Speaker 1: with you as an owner. And it will also probably
- 36:30Speaker 1: give them a place to hide too. They want to
- 36:31Speaker 1: have a place to hide UM so that they can
- 36:34Speaker 1: feel safe and secure. And then they also like to
- 36:36Speaker 1: soak too, apparently also when they're molting um shedding their skin,
- 36:41Speaker 1: they like to soak. So you want a little tub,
- 36:43Speaker 1: but they want to feel secure when they're in their
- 36:45Speaker 1: little tub of water too, So you probably want to
- 36:48Speaker 1: have like a lidded plastic container that you've cut a
- 36:51Speaker 1: hole out in the top and smooth the edges out.
- 36:54Speaker 1: You could be sure to do that UM so that
- 36:56Speaker 1: the snake can go inside it's little tub and soak
- 36:59Speaker 1: but also feel and closed in there too. Right And finally, uh,
- 37:04Speaker 1: part of being the owner of a constrictor that you've
- 37:08Speaker 1: got to feed these things. And when you have them
- 37:11Speaker 1: in your house and their domesticated, there's not snake food
- 37:15Speaker 1: that you shake out like a fish. Right as you
- 37:18Speaker 1: have this big can in just a bunch of mice
- 37:21Speaker 1: shake count Yeah, well that's what you gotta do, man,
- 37:24Speaker 1: You gotta you gotta feed them. Uh, they need to
- 37:26Speaker 1: be fed every week or maybe every two weeks, kind
- 37:30Speaker 1: of depending on their appetite. If they're young, you gotta
- 37:33Speaker 1: start out with a little tiny mice about every five
- 37:35Speaker 1: to seven days, and then as they get bigger, their
- 37:38Speaker 1: diet's gonna grow. So if you end up with a
- 37:40Speaker 1: six ft python, you're gonna have to feed it something
- 37:44Speaker 1: that will fill it up. In judging by this this
- 37:48Speaker 1: person feeding it this dead rabbit, it's not a fun task.
- 37:52Speaker 1: I'm sure they don't mind. They're up for that, but
- 37:55Speaker 1: I'm not sure. Um one of the other things too.
- 37:58Speaker 1: Like this is all if you have a bald python,
- 38:02Speaker 1: which is manageable and is not going to be able
- 38:04Speaker 1: to harm you even if it tried. But if you say,
- 38:07Speaker 1: have a Burmese python, there's entire steps that you have
- 38:11Speaker 1: to follow through that you wouldn't with other kinds of um,
- 38:14Speaker 1: smaller pythons, like, for example, when you're feeding it, you
- 38:18Speaker 1: never ever want to dangle its food in front of
- 38:20Speaker 1: your face, in front of its face with your hands,
- 38:24Speaker 1: because it might bite your hand and start to get
- 38:26Speaker 1: ahold of you. Um. Apparently, when it's feeding time and
- 38:30Speaker 1: they've sensed food, all of those genes start going crazy
- 38:34Speaker 1: and they like just they get a little bit of
- 38:36Speaker 1: like food fever, and they're not they're not behaving in
- 38:40Speaker 1: a way that you might expect them to. Write UM,
- 38:43Speaker 1: So you never want to dangle it with your bare
- 38:45Speaker 1: hands or your hands. You want to use like force
- 38:47Speaker 1: ups or something like that. And then also if you
- 38:50Speaker 1: have a Burmese python, you never feed it by yourself.
- 38:53Speaker 1: You always have to have at least one other adult
- 38:55Speaker 1: around with you, just in case something bad does happen.
- 38:58Speaker 1: It does happen from time to time. There's a guy
- 39:01Speaker 1: in the Bronx who was found dead in his apartment
- 39:05Speaker 1: and his pound eleven ft Burmese python was wrapped around
- 39:08Speaker 1: him still. He apparently had gone to feed it outside
- 39:12Speaker 1: of its cage a chicken that he had used his
- 39:16Speaker 1: hand to dangle in front of it, and it just
- 39:18Speaker 1: went bad. But that is extremely rare. But the point
- 39:21Speaker 1: is that can happen, so you have to be extra
- 39:24Speaker 1: safe and smart when you're feeding a Burmese python. Yeah,
- 39:27Speaker 1: it happens quick, like when this rabbit was dangled there.
- 39:31Speaker 1: There's such a chill sort of species, the way they
- 39:34Speaker 1: move around. And you know, we've all been to the
- 39:36Speaker 1: nature center and some people have held them and petted them.
- 39:39Speaker 1: They look very relaxed. But when that rabbit was dangled it,
- 39:42Speaker 1: when it popped at it and wrapped around it, it it
- 39:44Speaker 1: happened very very fast. And they will bite you too.
- 39:48Speaker 1: Even though it's not like a venomous bite. Um, it
- 39:51Speaker 1: still hurts, like their teeth can break off into your
- 39:54Speaker 1: hand or your arm or wherever. So it's not a
- 39:57Speaker 1: pleasant sensation from what I understand, even though it's not
- 40:00Speaker 1: going to kill you. That's right. And then finally, finally,
- 40:03Speaker 1: as far as endangerment goes, there are thirteen species on
- 40:07Speaker 1: the International Union of Conservation of Nature's Red List of
- 40:11Speaker 1: Threatened species, and I think the Ramsey's python is endangered.
- 40:16Speaker 1: The Burmese and the mean mar are vulnerable, so is
- 40:21Speaker 1: the Indian python too, apparently, but plentiful and Florida it
- 40:24Speaker 1: sounds like. Yeah, I was surprised that the Burmese pythons
- 40:27Speaker 1: still on that list for as good as it seeing Florida.
- 40:30Speaker 1: But maybe they're just thinking of the natural range of it.
- 40:33Speaker 1: That's right. And the biggest threat to pythons you guessed
- 40:35Speaker 1: it stars, Yes, not sharks. Ah you got anything else?
- 40:43Speaker 1: I don't have anything else. Thanks for putting this one together.
- 40:45Speaker 1: Shout out to definitely Live Science UM for that one
- 40:50Speaker 1: article about the guy who found out how you could
- 40:53Speaker 1: sequence the genes of pythons and just be amazed at
- 40:56Speaker 1: what you find. Yeah, thanks to Life Science. And there
- 40:58Speaker 1: were there were a bunch of different snake specialty websites
- 41:01Speaker 1: that we dug into for this sweet um. And if
- 41:04Speaker 1: you want to know more about pythons and just start
- 41:06Speaker 1: reading about pythons and think really long and hard before
- 41:10Speaker 1: you actually get one as a pet. But if you do,
- 41:12Speaker 1: take good care of it and tell it that we
- 41:14Speaker 1: said high. And since I said that, it's time for
- 41:17Speaker 1: listener mail, I'm gonna call this Salem Witch Family Trial
- 41:24Speaker 1: Family Connection. Hey, guys, have been listening to the show
- 41:27Speaker 1: for a few years, thoroughly enjoyed them. Recently listened to
- 41:30Speaker 1: Salem witchcraft trials and something towards the instruct me. You
- 41:33Speaker 1: mentioned that Salem was in Essex County. My mother's family
- 41:36Speaker 1: settled in Essex in the mid seventeenth century. So I
- 41:40Speaker 1: did a little research and found out that there was
- 41:42Speaker 1: an Elizabeth Morris in Newbury who was convicted of witchcraft
- 41:46Speaker 1: in eighteen I'm sorry, sixteen eighty. She was originally sentenced
- 41:49Speaker 1: to death, but that was changed to home confinement after
- 41:52Speaker 1: a second trial, and it turns out she is my
- 41:55Speaker 1: seventh great grandmother. Pretty cool. That was a bit of
- 41:59Speaker 1: fun family history to share with the Fens, with the
- 42:02Speaker 1: friends and family this Halloween season. And that is from
- 42:05Speaker 1: George Oaks. That is a great email, George Oakes. We
- 42:09Speaker 1: actually heard from a lot of people who were related
- 42:12Speaker 1: to people who were executed at the Salem witchcraft trials.
- 42:15Speaker 1: Did you know? I think we heard from a Corey
- 42:18Speaker 1: and a bunch of other people. So shout out to
- 42:20Speaker 1: all of you guys carrying the family lying on for
- 42:24Speaker 1: those old witches. But none of those matters, no, Now
- 42:29Speaker 1: they don't tell people. Um, well, if you want to
- 42:32Speaker 1: get in touch with us, you can Who was that
- 42:35Speaker 1: that wrote in George George Ookes If you want to
- 42:38Speaker 1: get in touch with us like George did, you can
- 42:40Speaker 1: send us an email like George did, to Stuff Podcasts
- 42:44Speaker 1: at iHeart radio dot com. Stuff you Should Know is
- 42:49Speaker 1: a production of iHeart Radio. For more podcasts my heart Radio,
- 42:53Speaker 1: visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
- 42:56Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows.