In the hours before the 2024 Florida Python Challenge kicked off on Friday, Aug. 9, python hunters with the trapping tour company C1Catch1 made the snag of a lifetime.
"It was awesome, it's pretty amazing. I've been catching them a long time, but this is something special," Carl Nicholson Sr., who runs the company, said.
The father and son duo, alongside a group from the Northeast, spotted the apex predator along US-41 in the Big Cypress National Preserve around 10 p.m. The challenge began at 12:01 p.m., so the catch was ineligible for prize money.
"What was going through my head was ... this is a big snake. It was awesome! I enjoy it; adrenaline rush for sure. When I first grabbed it and went to pull it and it wouldn't move, I'm like, it's a little bigger than I expected," Carl Nicholson Jr. said.
"She fought tooth and nail, but once you get behind the head, you can kind of control the rest of the body," Nicholson Sr. said.
The snake, measured by the trappers and taxidermists in East Naples, is 18 feet long exactly, from snout to tail. Eighteen feet is the third-longest Burmese python ever discovered in the Everglades.
"From what I hear, this is the biggest one yet (for the challenge). I haven't heard of any others caught being bigger than 15 feet," Nicholson Sr. said.
The Burmese python was dispatched humanely and will be stuffed.