Florida holds month-long snake hunt - with cash prize for the biggest one caught

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Almost 400 people have already registered to take part in Florida's great 'Python Challenge' of 2013, which begins on January 12.

According to the Daily Mail, officials came up with the idea to help control the population of Burmese pythons - which can grow up to 18 feet long.

Anyone who wants to take part just has to pay a £15 entry fee and complete a short online course - whoever catches the biggest snake wins a cash price of £930.

Hunters are required to leave the captured snakes at an official drop-off site within 24 hours of being caught.

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission's (FWC) website includes tips on how to identify the pythons and how to kill them. Recommended methods include cutting off their heads or shooting them.

Carli Segelson, a spokeswoman for FWC, told Fox News: "Whichever method they use, hunters have an ethical obligation to dispatch the snake as humanely as possible."

However, wildlife experts warn that contestants could be putting themselves at risk, as the Burmese pythons can be dangerous when provoked.

The Burmese Python kills by squeezing, then swallowing its prey. Although they are not usually dangerous to humans, experts believe that some of the larger pythons could overpower an adult.

Melissa Coakley, a spokeswoman for the Florida-based Suncoast Herpetological Society, told Fox News: "It takes a great deal of hands-on practice before one is able to master the art of catching and safely handling large constrictors. There is also the danger of hunters unwittingly killing native snakes while in the Everglades."

The FWC has said that it will ensure that hunters are staying safe - as well as following the rules - by putting a number of game wardens on duty.

Fox News reports that there could be tens of thousands of the Southeast Asian snakes living in the Everglades. The species began to invade the area after people who kept them as pets released them into the wild. The population has exploded in the Florida swampland and this has had a devastating effect on the native species like deer, bobcats and racoons on which it feeds.

Last summer, researchers found a 17-foot python, carrying nearly 90 eggs, in the Everglades.

A company called All American Gator, which harvests wild alligators to make clothing, accessories and furniture from their skin, has said that it will buy any large pythons captured during the hunt.

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