14-foot snake among creatures rounded up in Mardi Gras crackdown, officials say
Before more than a million people could swarm the streets of New Orleans for Mardi Gras, a group of wildlife officials patrolled the streets for potentially dangerous creatures.
While the crowd was preparing for one of the biggest parties of the year, the officials were on the hunt, navigating the mass of people in the historic French Quarter between Feb. 9 and Feb. 14.
Then they saw someone walking down the street holding a python, the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries told McClatchy News.
The 3-foot Burmese python belonged to a Baton Rouge resident, officials said, and was confiscated for violating Orleans Parish municipal codes. Another 3-foot snake, a ball python, was also found being carried by someone in the historic district.
Both were confiscated and safely removed from the area, officials said.
The snakes were small compared to what was coming next.
As the wildlife agents patrolled with members of the New Orleans Police Department, they received a call on Bourbon Street about someone else walking with a snake.
They responded and found a person walking with a 14.5-foot reticulated python, a constrictor snake, the agency said.
Officers closed in, causing the person holding the snake to drop it and run off, officials said. It was safely secured by the agents.
It didn’t stop there.
Wildlife agents reported seeing someone riding down the street on a bicycle with a live opossum in the bike’s basket.
The opossum was safely handed over to wildlife biologists, the agency said.
A fourth snake, a 10-foot python, was later discovered with its owner, and was also confiscated due to its size.
“Orleans Parish also has municipal codes that restrict ownership of snakes. That includes possession of any constrictor snake that is capable of growing to a size of 3 feet or larger. The snake does not have to be that size, only that it has the possibility of growing to that size,” the agency said.
Opossums are considered a wild animal by Orleans Parish municipal code and are illegal to own.
