Footage from Everglades National Park in Florida has recently gone viral on social media, showing an alligator dragging a massive python through the water. The video has drawn reactions of awe from people online, particularly non-Floridians who are unaccustomed to the exotic wildlife that can be found in the wilderness of the Everglades.
The video shows what appears to be a small to medium-sized alligator swimming through lily pads with the remains of a massive python that is substantially larger than the gator. Onlookers gasped in amazement at the scene before them, a display of nature that can be found nowhere else in the United States. One person behind the camera says, “That’s a really, really big python.”
One person commented on Facebook, “I’ve never been to florida, let alone the US, but I’m starting to think this city is as good as Australia when it comes to things that give me the heebie-geebies 🫣”. One man weighed in on the matter, opining, “First of all the snake has been dead for a while. In fact probably several days. The corpse is swollen and floating. Secondly a gator that size did not kill a snake that length.”
Highlighting the problem with invasive pythons in the area, one woman wrote, “Good, more gators need to follow suit. Pythons are invasive to the area and have been wreaking havoc for a decade now, changing the whole ecosystem system. If not controlled they could fail the whole Everglades and it would be the butterfly effect for the east coast.”
Echoing this anti-python sentiment, another person said, “I’m pretty sure the head is gone and 100% a full size Alligator CAN and has killed a python. And Good on him the pythons are not supposed to be here and are destroying the Everglades by eating everything and now even birds in trees.” Another person added, “Florida has a huge problem with how many of these pythons they actually have. This has been going on since Hurricane Andrew. The snakes are actually wiping out their ecological system out down there. They have hunters specifically for these snakes. This is just one that is this size!”
One Floridian expressed awe for the display of nature in the Everglades. “I miss my home. Nature is beautiful and crazy! Im not scared of these fellows. This one is in the everglades in his own home after all!” he said. Hoping it would scare away Californians, he added, “And for those of you scared, good. We dont want you down here anyways, go to california instead. 😂”
Another user suggested the alligator was swimming a victory lap, boasting in front of the group of tourists with the snake nearly twice its size hanging from its jaws. “This is the alligator’s version of a victory parade. He’s letting all his buddies see his spoils. Giving warning to other pythons. The tides are changing,” they wrote.
Watch the footage of the gator and the humongous python below:
Note: The featured image is a screenshot from the embedded video.
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