The Everglades Feature

In a January 2012 press conference on the Tamiami Trail, personnel from the U.S. Department of the Interior announced a nationwide ban on the import of Burmese pythons and other non-native, large constrictor snakes, including the yellow anaconda and both northern and southern African pythons. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar called the action a "milestone in the protection of the Everglades."

Pythons, sometimes freed by owners no longer wanting to care for large, growing snakes, consume native wildlife, competing with native predators. Biologists estimate thousands of Burmese pythons are now overrunning the Everglades, where they have eaten everything from marsh rabbits to alligators. Some studies suggest they could spread farther, possibly outside Florida. One python captured in the Everglades had consumed a full-grown deer.

(The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said it will consider listing as injurious five other non-native snake species: the reticulated python, the boa constrictor, DeSchauensee's anaconda, the green anaconda, and the Beni anaconda.)