Transcrição do Vídeo

has seen historic success in the

Everglades.

>> As Fox 35's Carlo Byron explains, it's

helping to remove Burmese pythons from

the wild in record numbers.

>> When Florida announced its plan to

release predators into the wild, the

world laughed. It sounded reckless, even

dangerous. But behind the controversy

was a science experiment born out of

desperation. The Everglades were dying,

and this was the last resort. What

followed would test everything we

thought we knew about nature's balance.

Before we laugh too hard at Florida's

gamble, maybe we should ask, what kind

of crisis forces people to make such a

wild choice? What was happening that no

one seemed to notice? Let's rewind to

where it all began. The silent

apocalypse.

Long before this chaos began, the

Florida Everglades looked like something

out of a nature documentary. It was an

endless green saw grass stretched toward

the horizon, broken only by the shimmer

of shallow water. Here, birds soared

overhead, raccoons scured through the

marshes, and bobcats stalked the edges

of the brush. Life moved in balance, and

every creature played its part in a

system worth an estimated $ 31.5 billion

each year. It was one of Earth's rare

places where wild still meant wild

because no one imagined that balance

could unravel so quietly. Now, this

story didn't begin with a bang. It

started with a storm. In 1992, Hurricane

Andrew tore through southern Florida,

flattening homes, ripping through

communities, and destroying a reptile

breeding facility near Miami. When the

winds died, a few exotic snakes had

escaped into the wetlands. At the same

time, overwhelmed pet owners were

releasing their once cute Burmese

pythons into the wild, thinking they

were setting them free. For years, no

one paid much attention.

>> Do what I think everybody wants to see

is get these Burmese pythons out of the

Florida Everglades.

>> There were snakes here and there that

seemed harmless, but they weren't. Those

early sightings turned into something

much darker. As the years passed, the

population exploded. What had started as

a few released pets became an invasion

hiding in plain sight. Now, experts

estimate anywhere from a 100,000 to

about 300,000 pythons slither through

South Florida's swamps. During mating

season, each female can lay close to a

100 eggs. Once they are hidden in the

undergrowth, they multiply faster than

anyone could track or trap. And now the

Everglades, a paradise once bursting

with wildlife, is falling silent. Also,

devastating numbers started to evolve.

Raccoon populations dropped by 99.3%.

Opossums fell by 98.9%

and bobcats by 87.5%.

Even marsh rabbits, which are always a

common sight, have nearly vanished, and

deer sightings have fallen by more than

90% in some areas. What the pythons

didn't eat, they displaced. The balance

that held the Everglades together was

breaking apart. And the worst part,

almost no one noticed. Not until it was

nearly too late. Now we begin to think,

why exactly were these snakes

unstoppable? Because in Florida, every

element of the environment seemed

designed to help them thrive. The heat,

the humidity, and the endless food

supply created a perfect home. With no

natural predators to keep them in check,

they thrived. Their camouflage made them

ghosts in the grass and nearly

impossible to spot. For scientists, it

was like fighting an invisible enemy.

Each snake removed seemed to be replaced

by 10 more. The invaders had found

heaven and they were consuming it. To

top it all, these weren't ordinary

snakes. They were apex predators capable

of swallowing a deer hole. Some grew

over 20 ft long and weighed more than

200 lb. Then videos of pythons battling

with alligators started surfacing,

shocking the world. In a food web once

ruled by native predators, the python

had taken the throne. What once

symbolized Florida's wild beauty was now

turning into a battlefield, and nature

was losing badly. Even so, the economic

and ecological stakes went far beyond

wildlife. The Everglades, with its $

31.5 billion ecosystem value, supports

tourism, fishing, and flood control for

millions. Yet every year the python

threat grew. Researchers and hunters

have captured over 23,000 snakes, but

that's barely 1% of what's out there.

The rest remain unseen, silently

breeding, spreading, and devouring. And

the swamp that once pulsed with life now

echoes with absence. And as officials

searched for solutions, nothing seemed

to work. The ecosystem was collapsing

from within. And the laughter over

Florida's crazy idea to fight back would

soon turn into silence. The real joke

was that while everyone mocked the plan,

the apocalypse had already arrived. It

wasn't loud or fiery. It was quiet,

creeping, and all too real. For years,

people believed there had to be a way to

take the Everglades back. What came next

proved how wrong that hope was.

Desperation and failure. At first,

Florida's response to the python

invasion looked like something out of an

adventure film. Officials opened the

gates to hunters, scientists, and anyone

brave enough to wade through miles of

swamp in search of the slithering

invaders. In 2013, a 10-day event called

the Florida Python Challenge that

sounded both daring and desperate

evolved. Basically, hundreds of people

showed up armed with traps, hooks, and

nerves of steel, ready to do what

decades of policy couldn't. By 2024, it

had become an annual spectacle. That

year alone, 857

participants from all across the US and

even Canada showed up to take on the

Everglades most notorious residents.

They captured

195 Burmese pythons, capturing headlines

and a round of applause from the public.

The winner walked away with a $10,000

grand prize. Hailed as a hero in the

fight to save Florida's wild heart. For

a moment, it felt like victory might

finally be within reach. But as it

turned out, the numbers hid a darker

truth. A year later, the 2025

competition broke new records. The top

hunter, Taylor Stanberry, caught about

60 pythons. This was literally the

highest total in the event's history.

Altogether, participants pulled out 294

snakes, a figure that sounded huge until

you realized how small it really was

compared to the estimated tens of

thousands still slithering free. The

Everglades wasn't healing. It was

gasping. And the pythons were

multiplying faster than anyone could

count. To make up for the shortfall, the

state brought in professionals. The

South Florida Water Management District

hired two dozen elite hunters paid

hourly to stalk the swamps year round.

These weren't weekend adventurers. They

were career python chasers armed with

everything science could offer. Still,

the snakes always seemed one step ahead.

So, Florida tried something new, which

was high techch warfare. Engineers

designed robotic rabbits that gave off

heat and scent to trick pythons into

striking. Dog teams were trained to

sniff out reptile scent trails. Drones

hovered above the wetlands, scanning for

movement. And wildlife biologists even

attached GPS collars to raccoons and

possums to track where predators might

be lurking. Some of the boldest

experiments involved using scout snakes

fitted with tiny radio transmitters to

lead researchers to hidden breeding

females. It was an ecological chess

game, one humans were determined to win.

Yet the harder they fought, the faster

the snakes seemed to spread. Since 2017,

contractors have removed over 23,000