Researcher responds to call claiming python ate woman only to make even more disturbing discovery inside belly
When you dedicate your life to the research of wild animals, it’s only natural what you’ll see is, well, wild. But nothing could have prepared this expert for what she saw when responding to a python-eating-woman call.
Wildlife biologist Rosie Moore has seen a lot in her time as a researcher, and that has led to her wanting to understand the root of it.
“Anything that can kill you is what I want to figure out,” she revealed in an interview with People, which was published today (21 August).
Rosie added: “I think people overestimate how dangerous some animals are because they just don’t have any baseline knowledge on how to operate or be around that animal.”
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However, a call she received whilst working in the Everglades, South Florida, US, was a bit much.
She explained that the person on the other end had described how an 18-foot deadly python had swallowed a woman, and was clearly ‘panicked’.
As a result, they allegedly beheaded the animal and took it to Rosie and her colleagues.
But when they opened the body up, a woman was not to be found.
Instead, it was an intact five-foot alligator in its stomach.
You might be wondering how the thin snake could have swallowed something so large, aggressive, and heavy.
But that’s thanks to a python’s ability to unhinge its jaw.
In the Everglades, the most common python you’ll encounter is the Burmese python, which, according to AZ Animals, is a constrictor.
Instead of being able to subdue its prey using venom, which paralyzes and kills its victims for it before the snake can swallow it...a python uses its crushing muscular strength to overpower prey, squeezing the life out of it before consuming it whole.
Despite alligators being known in Florida as dangerous creatures to be wary of, pythons are just as deadly in the Everglades, which is why researchers believe native wildlife and mammals have declined in the region.
“The alligator is the size of me, and the snake literally went from one side of the room to the other because it was so big and so heavy,” Rosie said of its size. “That was one of the craziest Everglades experiences ever. It’s very, very rare to see that in the wild, or get to dissect it and necropsy that, so that was really cool.”
Because of her passion for wildlife and all the craziness it includes, the researcher says there is a lot of questions from people about her career path.
“People ask me all the time, they’re like, ‘Why are you doing that? And why would that even be worth it?’ ” she said. “A lot of the things I’m doing are for research and for protecting the animals, and also documenting the animals and filming. So, to me, it’s always going to be worth it because that’s just my lifestyle, and that’s just what I want to do. I can’t imagine what I would do if I wasn’t doing stuff like that in my spare time.”
Sitting at home with a packet of crisps and watching Attenborough wouldn’t be a bad shout, Rosie.
Britt Jones