"This parasite can be transmitted without pythons being present."
It’s not enough that Burmese pythons are choking down Florida fauna wholesale, now they’re spreading a harmful parasite to native snakes that could travel far afield of the invasive constrictor’s southern stronghold.
The segmented squiggle infecting at least 13 species of homegrown serpents is commonly known as a “tongue worm” because the adult parasites are shaped somewhat like a tongue.
But they are actually a crustacean, evolved to live in the lungs of pythons, feeding off their blood and laying eggs that are pooped out to seed the land with more parasites. The eggs are typically ingested by an intermediary animal, such as a frog, which is then eaten by the native snakes.
Read more at the Sarasota Herald-Tribune