Latest Snake Stories

By Tom BrownEVERGLADES NATIONAL PARK, Florida -- The man leading efforts to eradicate giant Burmese python snakes from Everglades National Park sounds almost fearful, and certainly not optimistic, when he talks about the chances of wiping out an invasive species he calls "the enemy."That is partly because Skip Snow, a 54-year-old veteran wildlife biologist with the U.S. National Park Service, says he doesn't know how many of the slithery monsters are in the swampy Florida...

By Tom Brown EVERGLADES NATIONAL PARK, Florida (Reuters) - The man leading efforts to eradicate giant Burmese python snakes from Everglades National Park sounds almost fearful, and certainly not optimistic, when he talks about the chances of wiping out an invasive species he calls "the enemy." That is partly because Skip Snow, a 54-year-old veteran wildlife biologist with the U.S. National Park Service, says he doesn't know how many of the slithery monsters are in the swampy Florida...

By Borys Kit LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - As film back-stories go, this one is fairly serpentine. The Samuel L. Jackson thriller "Snakes on a Plane," which wrapped last September in Vancouver, went back before the cameras this month for five days of additional shooting in Los Angeles. In this case, it wasn't the usual reshoot, hastily assembled to fix a nagging story problem. Instead, distributor New Line Cinema decided to create new scenes that would take the movie from PG-13...

By Borys Kit LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - As film back-stories go, this one is fairly serpentine. The Samuel L. Jackson thriller "Snakes on a Plane," which wrapped last September in Vancouver, went back before the cameras this month for five days of additional shooting in Los Angeles. In this case, it wasn't the usual reshoot, hastily assembled to fix a nagging story problem. Instead, distributor New Line Cinema decided to create new scenes that would take the movie from PG-13...

NASA -- The most comprehensive analysis ever performed of the genetic relationships among all the major groups of snakes, lizards, and other scaly reptiles has resulted in a radical reorganization of the family tree of these animals, requiring new names for many of the tree's new branches. The research, reported in the current issue of the journal C. R. Biologies, was performed by two biologists working at Penn State University: S. Blair Hedges, professor of biology, and Nicolas Vidal, a...

By Wendel BroereLEIDEN, Netherlands -- More lizard families than previously believed are venomous, including several species that are popular pets, scientists said on Wednesday.Until now, pain and swelling from lizard bites assumed to be non-venomous were attributed to the bacteria that thrive on bits of meat left between their teeth from their scavenging diet.However, the symptoms are actually from the venom, a finding which could have implications for medical research, said Dr. Bryan Fry of...

PARIS (Reuters) - A dozen French firefighters were called in to cut their way to a 3 meter (10 ft) python hiding a shop just outside Paris, an official said on Sunday. "We were alerted by someone who said he had seen a snake on the roof of a shop," a fire brigade spokesman said. "We don't know where it escaped from. Probably from an apartment," he said. Police had taken charge of the reptile. The firefighters cut a hole in the false ceiling of a shop in Gentilly, south of Paris, to...

TOKYO -- Japan is moving toward requiring owners of potentially dangerous animals, such as crocodiles and pythons, to have microchips implanted in their pets in case the animals get loose, officials said on Thursday.The move follows a recent wave of incidents around the nation in which animals such as pythons, crocodiles and giant salamanders have been found wandering loose, frequently on the streets of densely populated cities.In one notorious case, a man lost track of his pet python after...

JOHANNESBURG -- They are powerful predators that constrict their prey but female African pythons also have a maternal side unheard of among egg-laying snakes: they spend time with their young after they hatch.The discovery underscores how little we know about the world of snakes and suggests their ways may be far more elaborate than scientists previously thought."I had reports from farmers that they had seen baby snakes and their mothers out together and I thought, this is...

ST. LOUIS (AP) -- It may not matter to people who hate snakes, but researchers at Washington University have discovered that rattlers are adaptable and have some interesting habits. For example, they swim and climb trees. Some males go more than six miles a year to look for mates. One snake caught rainwater in its funnel-shaped coil and drank from its own cup. The researchers, who have tracked 28 venoumous pit vipers for six years, also found that the snakes seem to prefer habitat...