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Posted by Byron Larkin on July 10, 2002 at 11:36:17:
In Reply to: Your point is well taken posted by David L. Martin on July 09, 2002 at 17:59:45:
While I certainly agree that there is a statistical relationship between population size and probability in this regard, I’m still unconvinced that this, alone, is a sufficient explanation for why no one has apparently killed, captured, or otherwise discovered a verifiable, 8’ or longer EDB in the last 65 years, or any other time, for that matter. For sure, the pristine wilderness of Florida is gone forever, along with many remote enclaves in South Georgia and Alabama that once harbored vast numbers of these magnificent creatures. However, back in the 1950’s and early 1960’s there was still a lot of prime EDB habitat to be found, and even today there are quite a few large, protected areas throughout the Panhandle, the Big Bend, in the Ocala National Forest, and north of Lake Okeechobee that remain relatively free from development and human encroachment. As such, I would argue that there has been ample opportunity for a great many EDBs to reach an advanced age in the wild in the last 40 years or so, yet the legendary “eight-footer” remains just that…a legend. I wish it were not so.
Although the notion that habitat destruction and road-kills have limited the number of EDBs that reach full maturity is an attractive one, I think that it falls short of a scientific explanation for the lack truly gigantic specimens. If anything, habitat destruction and human encroachment would seem to argue for the discovery of out-sized EDBs, if there were any, rather than the contrary. At any rate, the EDB’s sedentary nature, tendency to remain within a small home-range for life, and relative freedom from predation after the first two years of life, would, in and of itself, seem to suggest that the possibility remains that such a specimen could be out there, somewhere. Strangely, however, the older I get, the less I want someone to find one.
