A snake story
By ROWENA PLETT
Staff writer
"A python? No, it can't be. Not here in Tampa!" exclaimed Mayor Jim Clemmer when two men brought him a large snake in a sack.
That's what it was.
The story goes like this: On Sept. 14, Wilbert Backhus was stunned when he spotted a large snake in his yard at 5th and Columbus in Tampa. He knew it was no ordinary snake.
Walt Dietrich was working a couple of blocks away, so Wilbert enlisted his help in capturing the snake. As it headed into a culvert, they grabbed it by the tail, pulled it out, and Walt grasped it behind the head. It was nine and a half feet long.
They put it into a sack and took it to the mayor. Then Walt took it to his farm two miles east of Tampa and put it in a cage. Iona, Walt's wife, said it was huge and ugly and was four to five inches wide.
When word got out about the python's capture, the owner, whose name was not released, showed up to claim it. According to Iona, the owner said it was fatter and longer than when it went missing. He took it out of the cage and put it around his neck, she said.
He took it to the family home in Tampa and put it back into its heated cage.
The snake reportedly had been missing for 30 days and had grown a foot in its absence. Clemmer said the owner fed it rats and mice. Reportedly, the family had no fear of it and treated it as a pet.
Several parents with small children attended a special city council meeting Sept. 17 to express their concerns regarding the safety of their children.
The city has an ordinance that forbids exotic animals within the city limits. Consequently, the council voted to send a notice to the owner to dispose of the snake within 10 days of receiving the letter.
According to facts found on an Internet website, pythons naturally live near the equator and have become used to living in cities and towns since people have been moving in on their territory.
Pythons are not poisonous but kill their prey through constriction, squeezing the life out of them.
In the wild, pythons feed on lizards, monkeys, and antelope. The larger the meal, the longer it takes to digest. This means a python may only need to eat four to five times a year.
Pythons may hunt livestock but also may attack people when feeling threatened, "although this rarely happens," according to the website.
