Python Patrol? Uh, I Pass

'Python Patrol' Hunts Snakes in Florida

MARATHON, Fla. (March 30) -- Juan Lopez reads meters with one eye and looks for snakes with the other. Lopez is a member of the "Python Patrol," a team of utility workers, wildlife officials, park rangers and police trying to keep Burmese pythons from gaining a foothold in the Florida Keys.

Officials say the pythons -- which can grow to 20 feet long and eat large animals whole -- are being ditched by pet owners in the Florida Everglades, threatening the region's endangered species and its ecosystem.

"Right now, we have our fingers crossed that they haven't come this far yet, but if they do, we are prepared," Lopez said.

Burmese Pythons are rarely seen in the middle Florida Keys, where Lopez works. The Nature Conservancy wants to keep it that way.

The Python Patrol program was started by Alison Higgins, the Nature Conservancy's Florida Keys conservation manager. She describes it as an "early detection, rapid response" program made up of professionals who work outside.

Eight Burmese pythons have been found in the Keys.

"If we can keep them from spreading and breeding, then we're that much more ahead of the problem," Higgins said.

Utility workers, wildlife officials and police officers recently attended a three-hour class about capturing the enormously large snakes. Lt. Jeffrey L. Fobb of the Miami-Dade Fire Rescue Venom Response Unit taught the participants how to capture pythons.

"There's no immutable laws of snake catching. It's what works," Fobb said as he demonstrated catching a snake with hooks, bags, blankets and his hands.

"We're doing it in the Florida Keys because we have a lot to protect," Higgins said. "The Burmese pythons that are coming out of the Everglades are eating a lot of our endangered species and other creatures, and we want to make sure they don't breed here."

Where the snakes are breeding is just north of the Keys in Everglades National Park. An estimated 30,000 Burmese pythons live in the park.

The Everglades, known as the "River of Grass," is a vast area with a climate perfect for these pythons to hide and breed. And breed they do: The largest clutches of eggs found in the Everglades have numbered up to 83.

The snakes grow like they're on steroids. With a life span of 30 years, these pythons can weigh as much as 200 pounds. And the larger the snake, the bigger the prey. Biologists have found endangered wood rats, birds, bobcats and other animals in their stomachs.

Two 5-foot-long alligators were found in the stomachs of Burmese pythons that were caught and necropsied, officials say.

Officials also say Burmese pythons can travel 1.6 miles a day by land, and they can swim to reach areas outside the Everglades.

This nonvenomous species was brought into the United States from Southeast Asia. Everglades National Park spokeswoman Linda Friar says biologists believe that well-intended pet owners are to blame for their introduction into the Everglades.

"These pets were released by owners that do not understand the threat to the ecosystem," she said.

Higgins says 99,000 of the popular pets were brought into the United States from 1996 to 2006, the most recent data available. She says they are an easy species to breed, and you can buy a hatchling for as little as $20.

The problem with these pets, Friar says, is that they get too big for their owners to handle.

Making the owner aware of what to expect when the animal becomes full-grown is a priority.

"The pet trade is pretty supportive in educating people," Friar said. She hopes a "Don't let it loose" message campaign makes an impact on pet owners.

Florida Sen. Bill Nelson, a supporter of restoring the Everglades, has introduced a bill that would ban importing the python species into the United States. The senator saw the need after learning about the effect these snakes were having on the park.

"Finding out many endangered species are being found in the stomach of the python," Nelson spokeswoman Susie Quinn said, "we need to do a better job at protecting the resources."

In the meantime, Lopez and the Python Patrol will continue to protect the Florida Keys by capturing the snakes and turning them over to biologists to perform necropsies. The Nature Conservancy plans to expand the program to all the areas that surround the Everglades, making these predators their prey.

"I would like to find them and get rid of them," Lopez said.

Just keep in mind, "these animals did NOT ask to come here. I realize they can present problems, however, they need to be respected and dealt with humanely. They deserve to live their lives as do all of us.

"Animalz Rule",

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Dragons Kill Indonesian

Komodo Dragons Kill Man in Indonesia

JAKARTA, Indonesia (March 23) - Two Komodo dragons mauled a fruit-picker to death in eastern Indonesia, police and witnesses said Tuesday, the latest in a string of attacks on humans by the world's largest lizard species.

Police Sgt. Kosmas Jalang said 31-year-old Muhamad Anwar was attacked on Komodo, one of four islands where the giant reptile is found in the wild, minutes after he fell out of a sugar-apple tree on Monday.

He was bleeding badly from bites to his hands, body, legs and neck after two lizards, waiting below, attacked him, according to a neighbor, Theresia Tawa. He died at a clinic on the neighboring island of Flores soon after.

Attacks on humans by Komodo dragons — said to number at less than 4,000 in the wild — are rare, but seem to have increased in recent years.

An 8-year-old boy was killed in 2007 — the first recorded deadly attack on a human by one of the endangered lizards in three decades. A park ranger narrowly survived after one of the animals entered his hut last month and started biting his hands and legs.

There have been several other attacks in recent months, according to Metro TV.

The reptiles, which can grow up to 10 feet long (three meters) and weigh as much as 150 pounds, have shark-like serrated teeth and a bite that can be deadly. Its saliva contains roughly 50 different known bacteria strains, so infection is a risk.

Komodos can be found in the wild on the Indonesian islands of Komodo, Padar and Rinca. Tiny numbers also can be found on Flores.

YOU know, "I don't think YOU need to be messing around with these things". Matter of fact, "I don't think YOU need to be anywhere near these things. Pretty nasty critters.

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Orcas In The Gulf Of Mexico

Killer Whales Seen in Gulf of Mexico

(March 25) - It was a fish story that even veteran boat captains found fascinating: As many as 200 killer whales feeding on tuna in the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico.

"It was like being at Sea World because they'd come right up to the boat," said Eddie Hall, captain of the Shady Lady, the 60-foot charter boat that spotted the shiny black sea beasts with white eye patches and undersides. "It was pretty neat."

It was also hard for some skeptics to believe: Orcas, as killer whales are also known, typically are thought to live in cold water and eat seals.

But Hall's description of what he saw last Oct. 31 was no tall tale: A government biologist who saw video taken from Hall's boat confirmed the captain had spotted the creatures. And last week that same scientist, Keith Mullin, explained at a public meeting in Orange Beach, Ala., that yes, contrary to common perceptions, killer whales really do live in the Gulf, far from land.

Mullin, whose outfit has been working for years to get an accurate count of the Gulf's whale population, said it may be time to dramatically increase estimates on how many killer whales are lurking in the deep waters off the Gulf Coast. He's taking part in a research expedition this summer that could determine if his hunch is right.

Scientists believe the whales have been in the Gulf for years, Mullin said, and that their presence — though startling to some anglers — isn't a sign of climate change or other manmade condition. Their relatively small population and the speed at which pods move make them difficult to count, which could have led to lower estimates.

"I've got good records of them in the Caribbean. We see them almost exclusively in deep water, 600 feet and more," Mullin said. "I think they've always been there. It's just in the last 15 to 20 years that we've been trying to study them."

Hall told The Associated Press on Monday that the Shady Lady was 95 miles off the coast of Alabama when anglers and crew saw scores of the marine mammals feeding near an offshore rig in water more than a mile deep.

"There were four different pods. We estimated there were about 200 maximum. One pod had 75 in it," said Hall, who runs charters out of Zeke's Landing in Orange Beach, about 40 miles east of Mobile.

People on the boat took video and photos, including some with the offshore rig in the background to identify their location. But Hall said they got laughed off the dock when they returned.

"It was a joke because no one would believe us," he said.

Hall sent photos and video to Gary Finch, whose Fairhope-based Gary Finch Outdoors company produces a syndicated fishing and hunting television show. Finch then showed them to Mullin, who works at the Southeast Fisheries Science Center in Pascagoula, Miss., an arm of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration that researches marine life.

Mullin didn't have to look twice: Hall was right about seeing killer whales, although he couldn't tell by the video how many were near Hall's boat, he said in an interview with AP.

The Shady Lady sighting "created a stir" over killer whales in the Gulf of Mexico, Mullin said; about 80 people attended the informational meeting he held in Orange Beach last week.

Gulf orcas are just like the ones that live in cold water, Mullin said, save for their diet of dolphin and tuna instead of seals. Male killer whales average 20 feet in length and weigh as much as 12,000 pounds, but females are smaller.

Fifteen groups of killer whales have been sighted in the Gulf since deep-water surveys began in 1992, he said. Past estimates have varied widely, from a low of 49 to a high of 277 living in the Gulf north of a line extending from Key West, Fla., to Brownsville, Texas.

The actual number of killer whales in the Gulf could be closer to 500, Mullin said, and a two-month expedition this summer could help nail down an answer. The trip was planned independently of the boat's sighting, he said.

Either way, Hall's glad Mullin's outfit is involved. He knew what he saw, but he was still happy to get confirmation that his eyes weren't playing tricks on him.

This is so cool! Once again, it is another case of we, as humans, thinking we know everything about everything and in reality, except for the rare occasion, we don't know "jack" about very much.

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Killer Croc, Smart Dolphin

Crocodile Grabs Girl Swimming in Creek

DARWIN, Australia (March 16) - Police said they found human remains Monday in an Australian swamp where a crocodile snatched an 11-year-old girl.

The remains would undergo DNA testing to determine whether they belong to the girl who vanished Sunday while swimming with three children in a swamp on the outskirts of the northern city of Darwin, Northern Territory Police Superintendent Michael Murphy said.

A police statement said the find "strongly indicates she has died from a crocodile attack."

If confirmed, it would be the second fatal crocodile attack in northern Australia in five weeks.

Murphy declined to give details on the remains, which were found in water 500 yards from where the girl was last seen, he said.

The three children who had been swimming with the girl, including her younger sister, told police that they saw the head and tail of a crocodile "splash the surface" of the water near where she vanished moments earlier, Murphy said.

A search of the swamp late Sunday and Monday failed to find the crocodile.

The swamp is not far from crocodile-infested flood plains, but local Michael Dobrovitch said he swims there regularly.

"I get in, I get out quick, but I always have somebody with me" to watch for crocodiles, Dobrovitch told Australian Broadcasting Corp. radio.

A 5-year-old boy vanished from a river edge in northeastern Australia on Feb. 8, and officials later confirmed an attack when his remains were found in the stomach of a 14-foot crocodile.

Last September, a 62-year-old man was killed by a crocodile in another northeastern river while checking crab pots.

Crocodiles have become plentiful in Australia's tropical north since they became protected by federal law in 1971.

Obviously, this is a sad and tragic story, however, I have questions! Why were there not any adults around with these kids swimming in this swamp? Why were they swimming in this swamp when the area is known to have crocodiles. Why can't the authorities find the croc? Is the croc smarter than they are? Probably!!

On a lighter note, check out this story on "smart" dolphins dolphin bubble rings

"Animalz Rule",

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Giant Seabird With Teeth

Fossil Skull of Giant Toothy Seabird Found

LIMA, Peru (Feb. 28) - The unusually intact fossilized skull of a giant, bony-toothed seabird that lived up to 10 million years ago was found on Peru's arid southern coast, researchers said Friday.

The fossil is the best-preserved cranium ever found of a pelagornithid, a family of large seabirds believed to have gone extinct some 3 million years ago, said Rodolfo Salas, head of vertebrate paleontology at Peru's National History Museum.

The museum said in a statement that the birds had wingspans of up to 20 feet and may have used the toothlike projections on their beaks to prey on slippery fish and squid. But studying members of the Pelagornithidae family has been difficult because their extremely thin bones — while helpful for keeping the avian giants aloft — tended not to survive as fossils.

"Its fossils are very strange, very rare and very hard to find," Salas told The Associated Press.

The cranium discovered in Peru is 16 inches long and is believed to be 8 million to 10 million years old, based on the age of the rock bed in which it was found.

"Rarely are any bones of these gigantic, marine birds found fossilized uncrushed, and to find an uncrushed skull of this size is very significant," said Ken Campbell, curator of vertebrate zoology at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles.

Campbell, who examined photos of the find but was not involved in the dig, said he knows of "no specimen of comparable quality."

Dan Kepska, a paleontology researcher at North Carolina State University who also was not part of the project, agreed that the skull is the most complete ever reported.
He called the birds "one of the great enigmas of avian paleontology."

With fossils discovered in North America, North Africa and even Antarctica, Kepska said, the birds were ubiquitous only a few million years before humans evolved and scientists puzzle over why they died out. Some believe they are related to gannets and pelicans, while other say they are related to ducks.

Campbell said the Peru find "will undoubtedly be of great importance to our understanding of these gigantic birds, and it will help clarify the relationships of the other fossil pelagornithids found in the Pisco Formation."

The formation, a coastal rock bed south of the capital, Lima, is known for yielding fossils of whales, dolphins, turtles and other marine life dating as far back as 14 million years.

This is a really good find. The section of the paragraph above that is written in red, brings up a theory that was brought to my attention about a year or so ago about dragons. I was told by a knowing gentleman that YOU will not find dragon fossils because the bones were hollow(for flight)and would not stand the test of time as fossils. Is that a possibility? Could be.

"One Step Closer To Dragons",

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Shark Attack & Giant Shark - Australia/Hawaii

Shark Attacks Teen Off Popular Beach

SYDNEY, (March 1) - A shark badly injured a teenage boy while he was surfing with his father at a popular Sydney beach on Sunday, police said, the third shark attack in Australia's largest city in a month.

The 15-year-old boy and his father were in the water off Avalon on Sydney's popular northern beaches around dawn when he was attacked.

"Half an hour later the father heard a scream and turned to see his son thrashing about in the water. Fortunately the shark swam away and the boy was helped to shore by his father," police said in a statement.

The teenager was airlifted to hospital for treatment for leg injuries. Police said the bites "cut through to the bone" but the boy did not appear to have sustained any fractures.

Several beaches were closed after the attack. Water police and lifeguards were searching for the shark, while police hoped to identify its species by the shape of the bite marks.

Many shark species live in the waters off Sydney's popular beaches, but attacks on humans are still relatively rare.

However, there were two attacks on successive days last month, one on a navy diver in Sydney harbour and another on a surfer at the city's world-famous Bondi beach.

Fishermen say shark numbers are on the rise. Marine experts say environmental protection has created a cleaner environment which is attracting sharks closer to shore as they chase fish.

Many shark species, including the Great White, are protected in Australian waters.

Huge Shark Caught at Teahupoo

Last Thursday, two local brothers, Didier and Grard Parker, had been catching the Crown of Thorn starfish with fish nets, ridding the reef of the invasive species. As they pulled up one of their nets it became obvious there was something tangled in it bigger than a starfish, at first they thought it was a swordfish, but to their surprise it was a massive tiger shark. The shark had already drowned and was no threat.

In a weird way, it only makes sense that a shark this big would live in the surf at Teahupoo; raw power begetting raw power and all that. The waves at "Chopu" are nothing short of breathtaking. The Tahitian break isn't incredibly tall, but the surf there is thick, powerful and perfectly glassy. Honestly, even just watching it on TV without anyone surfing it is a wonder to behold, so it's no surprise that Billabong holds one of the WCT's marquee events there every year.

The 2009 Billabong Pro Teahupoo is scheduled to take place from May 9-20. Here's to hoping the surfers have the guts to hit the break after seeing what lurks below.

There is a way to avoid being fish food, "STAY OUT OF THE WATER"! It's their territory and home.

"Animalz Rule",

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American Crocodiles & Jaguars

Magnets May Halt Disruptive Crocodiles

Florida wildlife managers have launched an experiment to see if they can keep crocodiles from returning to residential neighborhoods by temporarily taping magnets to their heads to disrupt their "homing" ability.

Researchers at Mexico's Crocodile Museum in Chiapas reported in a biology newsletter they had some success with the method, using it to permanently relocate 20 of the reptiles since 2004.

"We said, 'Hey, we might as well give this a try," Lindsey Hord, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission's crocodile response coordinator, said on Tuesday.

Crocodiles are notoriously territorial and when biologists move them from urban areas to new homes in the wild, they often go right back to the place where they were captured, traveling up to 10 miles a week to get there.

Scientists believe they rely in part on the Earth's magnetic fields to navigate, and that taping magnets to both sides of their heads disorients them.

"They're just taped on temporarily," Hord said. "We just put the magnets on when they're captured and since they don't know where we take them, they're lost. The hope would be that they stay where we take them to."

Hord and his co-workers have tried it on two crocodiles since launching the experiment in January, affixing "a common old laboratory magnet" to both sides of the animals' heads. One got run over by a car and died, but the other has yet to return, Hord said.

Once an endangered species, American crocodiles' numbers have rebounded to nearly 2,000 in coastal south Florida, their only habitat in the continental United States. That puts them in increasing contact with humans, especially in areas where backyards border on canals around Miami and the Florida Keys.

Crocodiles are still classified as a threatened species, so game managers are reluctant to move them to new areas where they might be killed battling other resident crocodiles for turf rights, Hord said. Unlike alligators, which are far more numerous, each crocodile is considered important to preserving the species, he said.

"These crocodiles are unique and valuable creatures and we feel like we have a responsibility to live with these animals as much as we can," he said.

Many frightened residents don't share that view, although crocodiles are shy creatures, Hord said. Wildlife managers will try to relocate any thought to pose a significant risk, mainly those that seem to have lost their fear of humans.

Most crocodiles in Florida are tagged as hatchlings so biologists can easily recognize them, Hord said.

Any that come back twice after being captured and moved are sent to zoos or otherwise placed in captivity, something biologists hope to avoid if the magnet experiment works.

"This one is by no means a really well-developed scientific study with a control group. It's just something we thought we would try," Hord said. "We do have to make some room to live with them."

This story gets my blessing because of the fact that these people seem to get it. They realize that we need to learn to live with these ancient creatures instead of trying to destroy them. I hope this program works out well for the crocs and the people.

Here is a link to another animal story that is really on pointRare Jaguars Spotted in North America this is one I want to follow. Jaguars are such magnificent cats.

"All Animals Rule",

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Survival, Dog Style! Could YOU?

Dog found after missing 6 months in Montana

HELENA, Mont. — A 7-year-old golden retriever named Buck, startled by a train whistle last summer and lost for six months in north-central Montana, is back home in Washington state thanks to the efforts of several Chester residents.

"I've never had a miracle happen to me, so I don't really know what to think," said Kim Halter of Bonney Lake.

Halter said she, her husband and two of their sons were on a family trip to Montana in August when they stopped at a rest stop along U.S. Highway 2 in the small town of Chester.

"The dog was normally never on a leash. Big mistake," Halter said Thursday. "But he was always next to my son. He never left his side, so we never really had a problem.

"We were under the trestle when the horn blew. When Buck heard the whistle, he took off like a shot. None of us even saw him."

Halter said Maxine Woods, who lives across the highway, was waving her arms and trying to tell them that their dog ran away.

"He just basically disappeared," Woods said Friday. "He was just going faster than any dog I've seen run."

Woods joined the search for the dog.

"She got in her car and then she started calling people and before you knew it everybody around there was looking for our dog," Halter said. After two days of unsuccessful searching, the Halters, brokenhearted, resumed their travels.

"We went to the library and the librarian in Chester made us posters and wouldn't charge us a dime for them," Halter said. The family put up posters in banks and post offices in the small towns around the area.

"That was about all we could do," she said.

After a few false sightings, the family didn't hear anything for six months.

As fall turned into winter, heavy snow fell in the Chester area and temperatures occasionally fell into the 20-below-zero range.

"Every time we'd hear about the weather we would just cringe," Halter said. "I would just cry even harder, thinking 'Where is my Buck?' And of course I couldn't let my son (17-year-old Jason) know. I never let him see me cry because he kept the faith and kept the hope.

"He would tell me all the time that Buck's coming home," she said of her son, who had had the dog since it was a puppy. "He actually thought he was going to walk home like in (the movie) 'Homeward Bound.' "

It was about 27 degrees below zero early on Jan. 25, the day Jason Wanken spotted a stray dog on his family farm just north of Chester.

"We spotted this dog out here on the farm, just on and off, going through the creek and whatnot," Wanken said. "We just never had a prime opportunity to go over and get him."

Later in the week, Wanken used a snowmobile to bring some food to the dog, which had taken up residence under a collapsed building.

Wanken's mother had remembered the name of the golden retriever that had gone missing last summer and told Wanken to see if the dog would answer to the name Buck.

"The next day, I took the boys out with me and I had a full bag of food with me and I just rattled that bag," he said. "I started to feed it and could actually pet it then."

Wanken and his wife were able to use food to lure the dog into a kennel.

They took the dog to Woods' house.

"I thought it couldn't be this dog, though, it's been too long," Wanken said.

Woods called Halter on Saturday, Jan. 31.

"She e-mailed me three pictures and when I was on the phone with her I received the pictures, and we both started crying and I said that was him," Halter said.

Confirmation that the dog had an underbite sent the Halters on a 750-mile trip. "We drove all night," she said, arriving in Chester Sunday afternoon.

"When we got to the Wankens, he ran right up to us and it was absolutely without a doubt him," Halter said. "It was a miracle. He looked at us, and we looked at him and we were all crying. It was beyond amazing."

No one seems to know where Buck had been between Aug. 13 and Jan. 25.

"From the time he left us until the time Jason Wanken found him, there is no clue where he's been or what he's done," Halter said. "Only he knows. I almost feel like taking him to a pet psychic to see if they could tell me. Only he knows his secret and he's keeping it to himself.

"I tell ya one thing, he hasn't stopped smiling since he got home and neither have we."

I posted this not only because it is a tear jerker feel good story, which we could all use, but, it is an incredible story of "survival" to the ultimate. In this day and age, with all the garbage happening to alot of us, this should be an inspiration in getting your act together and moving forward despite all odds.

Think about it. This amazing animal soul was hundreds of miles from home and anyone he knew. He had to deal with weather conditions almost unimaginable. He had no one feeding or providing for him. He probably had to deal with and defend himself against wolves, bears and mountain lions. Yet, this amazing creature kept on pushing forward until he could return to the life he knew. Not just 6 days or 6 weeks, but, 6 months he persevered. He did not sit around waiting for someone or something to make things right for him. He did what he needed to do for his survival. Why can't all humans be like this? Humans may be the "dominant" species on the planet today, however, "the animals are light years ahead of us and will be here long after we are not"!

Here is a link for another touching animal story Koala Rescued From Scorched Land

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Reptillicus Gigantis(Big Snake)

Click to enlarge Credit: Jason Bourque

Ancient Snake Was Longer Than a Bus

Never mind the 40-foot snake that menaced Jennifer Lopez in the 1997 movie "Anaconda." Not even Hollywood could match a new discovery from the ancient world. Fossils from northeastern Colombia reveal the biggest snake ever discovered: a behemoth that stretched 42 to 45 feet long, reaching more than 2,500 pounds.

"This thing weighs more than a bison and is longer than a city bus," enthused snake expert Jack Conrad of the American Museum of Natural History in New York, who was familiar with the find.

"It could easily eat something the size of a cow. A human would just be toast immediately."

"If it tried to enter my office to eat me, it would have a hard time squeezing through the door," reckoned paleontologist Jason Head of the University of Toronto Missisauga.

Actually, the beast probably munched on ancient relatives of crocodiles in its rainforest home some 58 million to 60 million years ago, he said.

Head is senior author of a report on the find in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature.

(The same issue carries another significant report from the distant past. Scientists said they'd found the oldest known evidence of animal life, remnants of steroids produced by sponges more than 635 million years ago in Oman.)

The discoverers of the snake named it Titanoboa cerrejonensis ("ty-TAN-o-BO-ah sare-ah-HONE-en-siss"). That means "titanic boa from Cerrejon," the region where it was found.

While related to modern boa constrictors, it behaved more like an anaconda and spent almost all its time in the water, Head said. It could slither on land as well as swim.

Conrad, who wasn't involved in the discovery, called the find "just unbelievable.... It mocks your preconceptions about how big a snake can get."

Titanoboa breaks the record for snake length by about 11 feet, surpassing a creature that lived about 40 million years ago in Egypt, Head said. Among living snake species, the record holder is an individual python measured at about 30 feet long, which is some 12 to 15 feet shorter than typical Titanoboas, said study co-author Jonathan Bloch.

The beast was revealed in early 2007 at the University of Florida's Florida Museum of Natural History in Gainesville. Bones collected at a huge open-pit coal mine in Colombia were being unpacked, said Bloch, the museum's curator of vertebrate paleontology.

Graduate students unwrapping the fossils "realized they were looking at the bones of a snake.
Not only a snake, but a really big snake."

So they quickly consulted the skeleton of a 17-foot anaconda for comparison. A backbone from that creature is about the size of a silver dollar, Bloch said, while a backbone from Titanoboa is "the size of a large Florida grapefruit."

So far the scientists have found about 180 fossils of backbone and ribs that came from about two dozen individual snakes, and now they hope to go back to Colombia to find parts of the skull, Bloch said.

Titanoboa's size gives clues about its environment. A snake's size is related to how warm its environment is. The fossils suggest equatorial temperatures in its day were significantly warmer than they are now, during a time when the world as a whole was warmer. So equatorial temperatures apparently rose along with the global levels, in contrast to the competing hypothesis that they would not go up much, Head noted.

"It's a leap" to apply the conditions of the past to modern climate change, Head said. But given that, the finding still has "some potentially scary implications for what we're doing to the climate today," he said.

The finding suggest the equatorial regions will warm up along with the planet, he said.

"We won't have giant snakes, however, because we are removing most of their habitats by development and deforestation" in equatorial regions, he said.

See, this is what nightmares are made from. Please, can YOU imagine hiking, biking, camping or, any outdoor activity, and running up on this?! Oh well, we are getting another step closer to finding Godzilla. By the way, there were other new discoveries made recently. Click this link to check some of them out

10 New Amphibian Species Discovered

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Pink Lizard 5 Million Yrs Old, Where's Godzilla?

New Pink Lizard Found on Galapagos

QUITO, Ecuador (Jan. 7) - Hard to believe a giant, pink lizard could be overlooked for almost two centuries.

Charles Darwin missed it during his 1835 study of the Galapagos Islands that led to his theory of evolution. Park rangers ignored the pink and black-striped reptiles after accidentally happening upon them in 1986. Some thought the stripes were just stains.

But scientists now have documented a new species, the iguana "rosada," (pink in Spanish), which may be one of the archipelago's oldest, according to research published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Blood and genetic tests on 36 pink iguanas -- which average 3 to 5 feet in length -- show the lizards belong to a previously undiscovered species that appears to live exclusively around Isabela Island's Wolf Volcano, an area Darwin never explored.
Researchers from the University of Rome Tor Vergata and Galapagos National Park began to investigate in 2001 whether the lizards were a different species or an adaptation for environmental or food reasons of the Galapagos' two known land iguanas: the Conolophus subcristatus and Conolophus pallidus.

But the pink iguana, it turns out, is older and likely the predecessor of the two, said Cruz Marquez, a biologist who is part of the research team. It dates back more than 5 million years, researchers say.

The pink iguana has not yet been given a scientific name.

"To discover a large vertebrate that was unknown in an area where there has been a lot of research is very special," Marquez told The Associated Press by telephone from the park.

The pink iguana population size, eating and reproductive habits are still unknown, and no young animals have been discovered, according to a park statement. Further research will determine what resources are needed to guarantee the lizards' survival.

"We need to clarify if reproduction is impeded and for what reasons," lead researcher Gabriele Gentile told the AP, noting that feral cats in the area may be eating the iguana's eggs.

The Galapagos islands, an archipelago located about 620 miles off Ecuador's Pacific coast, were protected as a UNESCO's Natural Heritage site in 1978. In 2007 UNESCO declared them at risk due to harm from invasive species, tourism and immigration.

The islands are known for their unique flora and fauna, including marine and land iguanas, blue-footed boobies and giant tortoises that live up to 150 years of age. The variety of finches on the islands inspired Darwin's theory of evolution.

Once again, we, humans that is, have discovered another new species. A large pink lizard. I know, if YOU don't read this story or see the picture, YOU are sitting there going, "yeah, right, a pink lizard"? Well, they found a "pink" lizard.

If they found a "pink lizard", YOU know it is just a matter of time before they find the "king". GODZILLA! Look, do YOU think some Japanese dude was sitting around drinking some bad sake and just came up with Godzilla? NOT! Somebody, during some period of time, saw this creature and passed it down through time. The same applies to "dragons". Keep looking. After all, "only 5% of the oceans on this planet have been explored. We still have 95% to give up the goodies"!

"Animalz, Pink Or Green, Rule,"

Bobby Sharpe Bobby Sharpe's "Indigo Spiritz": "I Don'T Know, Do YOU"? Bobby Sharpe's "Indigo Spiritz": "2012" Are YOU Prepared?