Such a Florida way of problem solving.
It’s no secret that Florida has a python problem. Thanks to exotic animals trading and Floridians releasing their pet snakes into the wild, Burmese pythons were introduced to “The Sunshine State” and have since taken over as quite possibly the most invasive of all the invasive species out there.
The snakes can grow up to 20 feet long, and fully grown pythons can typically weigh in at around 200 (they can eat pretty much anything that their bodies will fit around). Florida just so happens to be the perfect place for them to thrive… yet they aren’t native to the area, so with mature pythons having little to no natural predators in the area, they’ve greatly disrupted the natural environment.
Across decades, the state of Florida has tried to rid the pythons from places like the Florida Everglades. And though they’ve successfully removed around 20,000 of the invasive species from the Florida swampland since 2006, the state is still losing the battle. Burmese pythons are quite reclusive, and females can lay 50 to 100 eggs at one time… so it’s tough to get a total count on the invasive species’ population.
But it’s believed to be somewhere around 300,000 to 1,000,000 (wide range, I know).
For years, Florida has been trying to figure out how to eliminate the python population. They host an annual python challenge where the state rewards the person who captures and kills the most snakes, and even the crazy population of Florida can’t put a dent in the issue. So you know what the “Sunshine State” went and did? Partnered with a leather goods company to really kick the Burmese python extermination into high gear.
The company is called INVERSA, and they specialize in turning invasive species into handbags, wallets, belts, jewelry and shoes. Governor Ron DeSantis stated that the partnership has “supercharged” python removal in the state, and that the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s Python Action Team removed more snakes in the month of July than they did in the entire year of 2024.
I’d say that the partnership is working swimmingly if that’s the case, and the process matches right up with INVERSA’s mission statement:
“Something positive from something negative. As a humane byproduct of ecosystem restoration that addresses the harm caused by non-native species, INVERSA ethical exotics restore balance to nature.”
And they are restoring balance in Florida alright.
The INVERSA partnership has apparently put the FWC a year and a half ahead of schedule in regards to Burmese python removal. Just this past summer, over 1,000 pythons were removed from the Everglades. In 2024, less than 350 snakes were taken out of the invasive population.
The bad news? There’s still hundreds of thousands of pythons slithering around the state of Florida. The good news? According to Ron DeSantis and the FWC, their recent efforts in partnership with INVERSA are working:
“Last year, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission announced a partnership with Miami-based company Inversa to help preserve the Everglades’ biodiversity by removing invasive species, namely Burmese Pythons. They have already delivered on their Year 2 objective – one and a half years ahead of schedule.
In the first three months of this partnership, FWC and Inversa have tripled the number of python removals from the Everglades. FWC contracted python hunters are now getting paid about 60% better for each snake, and morale is higher than ever.
This success is a result of our $2 million investment in the budget to reinforce our python removal efforts. The legislature should ensure that this investment will recur annually, so we can keep improving the rate of python removal to protect Florida’s native ecosystems for future generations.”
