Florida Python Hunters Turn Up Empty-handed

That's one of the leading reasons that the FWC can't afford to let the northern African rock python reach the wetlands as well. It's one thing to fight a costly war of attrition against one snake army, but two? That would be a catastrophe.

Still, with this last hunt ending in zero discoveries, victory may be close at hand. Eckles added that while she doesn't believe the fight against the African python is done yet, the FWC will likely be able to declare their work a success if the snake doesn't resurface over the next few years.

"It's a big deal to have a success story and say we did it," Brian Smith, a University of Florida researcher, told the Miami Herald.

The problem, he went on to say, is that resolving the African python problem will do nothing to help solve the Burmese conundrum. The difference in hunting methods and situation, he explained, is too great.

Frank Mazzotti, a colleague of Smith's and a wildlife ecologist, added that currently biologists only have only a one percent detection rate for Burmese in the Everglades. That rate, he suggests, needs to be at least 50 times greater to make an impact.

"We're not going to win this war until we develop the atom bomb," Mazzotti told the Herald.

The trouble is, despite a tentative victory on a nearby front, that hypothetical war-winning bomb remains a pipe dream.

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