FLORIDA HIRES OFFICIAL PYTHON HUNTERS

Florida has had a problem for many years now with python snakes, a non-native species that is causing damage to the natural Florida wildlife. The South Florida Water Management District Governing Board is hiring official snake hunters this year. The state is looking for 25 python hunters. You can work up to eight hours a day at $8.10 an hour. Plus, there are cash bonuses. You get $50 for each snake measuring up to 4 feet and an additional $25 for every foot past that. Hunters can score another $100 for each python taken out that was found guarding a nest of eggs. The agency just started accepting applications Friday morning. You have to be 18, have an iPhone or Android phone so you can use a GPS app, have a driver’s license and have no felonies or wildlife-related offenses within the last five years.
* Also, you can’t scream like a little girl when you touch the snake. It scares the birds.
* The hard part is learning the snake call.
* “Florida – We’re Putting the Squeeze on Pythons.”
* Florida pythons come in four sizes: small, medium, large, and Has Anybody Seen Tony?
* Could be worse. You could be hunting feral pigs.
* I smell a cable reality show.
* Here’s the bad part: The female snakes lay 50 little snake eggs at a time.
* I mean you don’t have to be a math whiz to see the problem there.
* Especially since Florida, in the language of snakes, means “One Big Buffet.”
* Wait, for 8 bucks an hour I get to wade around a swamp with some pythons? There has to be some catch. This is TOO good!