Meet the women hunting giant pythons ‘eating everything’ in the Everglades
On the morning of November 12, Everglades resident Barbara Brace was awakened by the pounding of a giant alligator she had never seen before. The next thing she knew, she and her husband were having breakfast on their back porch, eating a steak they’d never seen before.
“It was just the biggest gator ever seen in our area,” said Brace at the time. “It was eating everything!”
But she and her husband had been wrong about the giant alligator — it wasn’t the biggest one they’d ever seen after all.
Last week, Brace’s husband, Tom, took action to correct the error. He contacted the non-profit Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC) and helped to track down the animal he described as “the biggest gator ever seen in our area,” adding that he was “pretty sure it was the biggest gator we’ve ever seen.” The organization, which focuses on environmental safety, immediately went out on a hunt to confirm his story, and have a photo of the animal.
“When he was able to positively identify it as a giant alligator, we were able to get a video up on YouTube and we even had our own camera on the other person that had claimed to see him — all of which was verified,” she said.
Brace and her husband have long been interested in alligators. As they travel and spend money on various adventures, they often find alligators on their property, and they go out in their boat to try to catch and release the animals.
“We actually have a big pond on our property — our main pond is located a few miles from our house. Every year, in November and December, we go out and catch alligators and release them into this pond,” she said. “We have a pond camera, and we actually send a picture of them being released to me every year. We have to pay for the water bills for this. We spend a lot of