Snake kills girl in fla

[tommymac]

Originally Posted by Rider

Hey Tommy, can you train a snake to be a pet though? Domesticate it like a dog? Some dogs have the capability to kill people for food, but you never hear of family pets killing for food like this python did. If they attack it's not for food.

yes and no. Certain species of snakes are more or less agressive by nature. Burmeese pythons as a whole have a very good temperament esp for alarge snake, whereas the other giant constrictors are rather nasty as a whle. Also it depends on how it was raised. If its handled a lot and is around people from a hatchling they will be prety good.

Dogs I think through breeding have lost some of that wildness so are much less likley to do something like that. Snakes are much simpler creatures in that they kill and eat and not much else, they have some of the smallest brains of all the vertabrates. You can blunt the feeding response if they only eat prekilled food though, yet my largest carpet python is about 6 yrs old has never eaten a live animal but still has a strong feeding response.

theres not a lot of detail in the story but when a snake is threatened it will usualy strike and let go. If it strikes and wraps around you its because it wants to eat you or feels realy threatened and I cant see a sleeping 2 yr old as agreat threat to a 12 ft python, so I think the snalke was hungry saw a potential meal and went for it.

Tom