A Burmese python was forced to vomit a white-tailed deer when temperatures in Florida dropped to 50 degrees Fahrenheit. (Photo: Travis Mangione, U.S. National Park Service)
A Burmese python in Florida's Big Cypress National Wildlife Refuge regurgitated an entire white-tailed deer after temperatures in South Florida dropped below 50 degrees Fahrenheit (10 degrees Celsius) late last year, well below the cold-blooded creature's comfortable range.
Although pythons are known to regurgitate their prey in cold laboratory conditions, scientists have never caught these elusive snakes doing so in the wild—until now. The unusual observation, made in late November 2024, is described in a study published in July in the journal Ecology and Evolution.
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Burmese pythons (Python bivittatus) have been an invasive species in Florida since the late 1970s. Despite their long-standing presence, they are poorly studied, and gaps exist in our knowledge of the snakes' biology and their interactions with native species, such as deer.
Deer numbers in the preserve are declining, which is concerning because they form an important part of the diet of local predators such as Florida cougars (Puma concolor coryi). To learn more about how often snakes eat deer and how quickly they digest them, preserve scientists spent a year monitoring the digestion of several large female pythons—those considered most likely to consume deer.
One of the observed snakes had a large lump in its stomach, indicating it had eaten something the size of a deer. However, over the next few days, the lump did not seem to shrink.
A week after first being observed eating a large food pellet, the Burmese python is resting in the water while continuing to digest its food.
After a cold night, when the temperature in the reserve dropped to 9.4°C, scientists examined the snake again. They found it, unclumped, floating in the shallows of a willow swamp next to a nearly undigested white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) it had regurgitated.
“They found it completely empty, but they were able to smell a deer nearby and put two and two together,” Sandfoss said.
The 2.5-year-old, 61-pound (28-kilogram) white-tailed deer was minimally digested, even after spending about 10 days inside the snake.
Because snakes are cold-blooded, or poikilothermic, they struggle to function in cold conditions. Their biological processes, including digestion, slow down until the temperature rises.
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If the outside temperature drops too low, a snake's food can begin to decompose in its stomach faster than it can digest it, leading to a buildup of bacteria. In response, the snake vomits to rid itself of the bacteria. This can be an energy-consuming activity for an already hungry snake, but the snake in the study survived.
According to Sandfoss, since the Burmese python is an invasive species in Florida, the snake's survival has complex consequences. It missed one of its largest meals, which it only eats a few times a year, so it may lack the energy to reproduce, which could help control the python population. Alternatively, the snake may kill another deer to replenish its lost energy, further threatening the deer population that local predators rely on.
“Deer populations in Big Cypress have been declining for several years, and we believe pythons are playing a significant role,” lead study author Travis Mangione, a biologist with the National Park Service (NPS), told Live Science. “Because this python survived the vomiting, it will continue to feed on local wildlife.”
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While scientists study how Burmese python vomiting affects local ecosystems, observations of them in the wild provide valuable information about how far this invasive species may spread within the United States. Temperature is a key factor limiting the snakes' range, and the lowest temperature they can survive may be the lowest they can digest, Sandfoss said.
The new study is part of a larger, as-yet-unpublished project analyzing python diet data for an entire year. Scientists working on the project hope it will shed light on the basic biological process of digestion in Burmese pythons, which remains poorly understood.
“Pythons have complex biology, and we've never encountered an animal of this scale—an animal this large, aggressive, terrestrial, poikilothermic,” Sandfoss said. “We're trying to figure all these questions out.”
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KR Callaway, Live Science researcher
K.R. Callaway is a freelance journalist specializing in science, health, history, and politics. She holds a bachelor's degree in classics from the University of Virginia and is currently pursuing a master's degree in science, health, and environmental reporting at New York University.
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