The author of The Eastern Evil
According to domestic media reports, a villager in Changrong Village, Xi'nan Town, Zhangping City, Fujian Province, recently encountered a moment of horror while harvesting rice in a rice field, and he encountered a large python more than five meters long. According to the villager's description, he was harvesting straw in his family's rice field when he suddenly heard a movement in the rice next to him. When he saw that the rice paddies in the distance were very calm, he thought that there should be wild animals under the rice paddies, so he took a sickle and picked up the rice that was moving, and a large python appeared in front of him.
The villager took a few steps back after seeing the python, then immediately exited the rice field and picked up his mobile phone to call the police. Local police and professional snake catchers quickly arrived at the scene, and they determined the location of the python and put it in a bag. Although the process was somewhat laborious, as the python was indeed heavy, supposedly weighing 70 kilograms, the python did not attack anyone, much to the curiosity of the onlookers. So what kind of python is this python that appears in a rice field? Why does it not resist or attack people when it is arrested?
After "collecting" the python, the snake catcher introduced the villagers to a Burmese python, which can be judged from the pattern on its body surface. The Burmese python, also known as the Southern Snake and the Qin Snake, is one of the six giant snakes in the world. It is mainly distributed in the tropical rainforests of Southeast Asia, often near water sources, and sometimes in trees. According to the situation that has been found so far, most Burmese pythons are within 5 meters in length.
According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the longest Burmese python in history is 9.75 meters long, with two tops. Studies have found that burmese pythons have been increasing in size throughout their lives, because they have a large number of vertebrae hyperplasia in their bodies, so they can grow from tens of centimeters to several meters at the beginning. The average body length of the Burmese python reaches 7 meters, the weight reaches 91 kg, and the average female individual has a longer body length than the male individual.
Although the Burmese python looks terrible, it is a non-venomous snake, so people are more afraid of its huge body and its ability to swallow humans. When it comes to eating, Burmese pythons are uncompromising carnivores, and their main diet is mammals, reptiles and birds. Although the Burmese python has no natural enemies in nature, it is still a second-class protected animal in China, mainly because the population of this animal is relatively small, and it has a certain role in maintaining ecological stability.
Snakes are thermotropic animals, and the temperature of their bodies changes with the change of ambient temperature, so the state of the snake is largely related to the ambient temperature. Once the ambient temperature is around 10 degrees Celsius, the body temperature of the snake can only be maintained at around 10 degrees Celsius, which leads to a decrease in the enzyme activity in its body, thus leaving it in a "weak" state and unable to show a ferocious attack posture. But now that it is the transition between summer and autumn, the temperature in Zhangping, Fujian Province, is higher than 20 degrees Celsius, so the body temperature of the Burmese python that was found should not be low.
The higher body temperature ensures that the enzymes in the python's body remain highly active, so the temperature is not the reason why the Burmese python does not attack humans. There is another factor, that is, it is in the digestion stage when it is found by farmers shortly after eating. Autumn is the last chance for snakes to accumulate fat, and before winter comes they need to stock up enough fat to ensure they have enough energy in their caves to spend the winter.
The python that has just finished eating usually shows fatigue, and most of its body energy is spent digesting food, so it can be speculated that the Burmese python found by the farmer may have just finished eating, and after it touched humans, humans did not attack it, so it was too lazy to struggle. After being bagged, police and snake catchers took it to a distant forest to release it.
summary
The most suitable environmental temperature for snake activities is 20 to 30 degrees Celsius, and the growth rate of snakes in this range is also rising as the temperature rises, so summer is generally the most active season for snakes, and it is also the season when snakes appear most in human vision. In the past two months, there have been many snakes in the south of China, such as 14 small snakes in a warehouse in Maoming, Guangdong, and a king cobra hiding in a farmer's home in Guangxi, which was hidden in the hostess's bedroom bed, which was really scary.
Although the summer solstice has passed, from the perspective of the season, autumn has arrived, but we can clearly feel that autumn has not yet come, summer is still continuing, so friends who live in natural areas such as mountains and forests, fields, etc., must pay attention to observe whether there are snakes. Although the chance of us encountering a large python is relatively small, the chance of encountering a poisonous snake is not small, so everyone still has to be on this guard.