It was about 2 in the morning when Claudilio Cruz, a member of a road crew spreading asphalt on U.S. 1 in the affluent Miami suburb of Pinecrest, heard frantic honking.
When he looked up he was blinded at first by headlights, but then noticed something, frankly, unbelievable: A 14-foot Burmese python slowly slithering across the six-lane highway.
Another car almost ran the snake over. Cruz managed to stop traffic — for the safety of both the late-night drivers and the snake.
This was not the middle of the Everglades. This was the middle of suburbia. The snake was less than a mile from the Dadeland mall, amongst a strip of office buildings, car dealerships, restaurants and shopping centers.
How had the huge reptile gotten there, and are there more of the apex predator infiltrating suburbia? It was among more than a dozen reported python sightings so far this year in suburban or industrialized settings across South Florida, as experts say they’re spotting the snakes more often.
They’re found in all sorts of places — in backyards, under a car in a driveway in Miami-Dade, crossing a housing development in Weston, and traveling past a road near the turnpike east of Wellington.
“Sightings definitely are increasing in suburban areas,” said Lt. Chris Pecori, of the Miami-Dade Fire Rescue venom response unit, whose team often responds to snake calls.
Calling for help
The python near the Dadeland mall made it across all six lanes, and Cruz immediately called 911.
When the Pinecrest Police Department showed up, they quickly humanely euthanized the snake, as per Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission guidelines, and posted a photo on their Facebook page of Sgt. Carlos Atola and a sheriff’s deputy holding the snake last month.
The theories came up: One possibility is that the snake was an escaped pet, which would be highly illegal. It’s been against the law to buy or sell Burmese pythons in Florida since 2010 and illegal to possess them since 2021.
The state banned Burmese pythons because they’re too good at what they do. After being introduced to Florida wilderness areas via the exotic pet trade in the 1970s, ’80s and ’90s, the invasive predator has thrived, plundering Everglades National Park and other areas.
One study showed that mammal sightings in python-rich areas of the park have dropped by 98% since the 1990s. Marsh rabbit sightings in the park have dropped by 100%.
And the snakes have expanded their range north. Wildlife biologists now consider them established as far north as Lake Okeechobee and the suburbs of Fort Myers.
Wild snakes usually have injuries and scars, and can be infested with parasites such as ticks, said Melissa Miller, who specializes in invasion ecology for the University of Florida and who tracks Burmese pythons in the water conservation areas west of Fort Lauderdale.
A spokesperson from the Pinecrest Police Department said in an email that the snake near the mall had plenty of scars around its neck and head, and that it was aggressive.
So the snake may well have been wild. Over the last decade, the police department alone has had five confirmed python captures and three more calls where the suspected pythons could not be located.
And in August, WPLG-Ch. 10 reported that Miami-Dade Fire Rescue crews had captured two Burmese pythons miles from the Everglades. One was tucked inside of the engine compartment of a tractor-trailer in a farming area north of Homestead Air Reserve Base, and another in someone’s backyard in Doral.
Pecori, of the venom response unit, said, “We usually pull two (Burmese pythons) a month, but just in the last couple of months we’ve been getting a lot more. In the last month and a half we’ve probably gotten six.”
He said some of those snakes have come from western sector, closer to the Everglades, but Pecori also has seen a geographic shift over the years.
“We’ve been pulling them farther north and farther east,” he said. “We used to pull them mainly in the far western boundaries (of Miami-Dade County) or in the south end of the county — from north Homestead and down. Now we’re getting them in Coral Gables, Palmetto Bay, South Miami.”
“There are pythons in the surrounding areas,” Miller said. ”There’ve been pythons found in Fairchild (Tropical Botanic Garden) and Matheson Hammock.” Those parks are about 3 miles from where the snake was found.
Miller said the snakes do well in “disturbed areas, like agricultural land and suburban environments.”
By analyzing the data from EDDMaps, an interactive mapping system that allows the general public and wildlife officials to document invasive species, the South Florida Sun Sentinel was able to find more than a dozen Burmese python sightings and captures in the last seven months, since May of 2025. Many other occurred in protected wilderness conservation areas, but all of the below occurred in suburban or industrialized settings in Broward, Palm Beach and Miami-Dade counties.
Broward County
Aug. 17, 2025, a python coiled around prey in a pond in the heart of Weston.
July 31, 2025, a resident photographs a python crossing a housing development in Weston.
July 07, 2025, a resident photographs a python tucked against a house foundation in Weston.
May 31, 2025, a python spotted at the south end of Weston, off Griffin Road.
May 30, 2025, a python photographed at night in a garden in Weston, close to I-75.
May 15, 2025, a python spotted in Weston outside a gas station that backs up to a pond, and about a quarter-mile from the Everglades and Francis S. Taylor Wildlife Management Area.
Palm Beach County
Sept. 30, 2025, a python photographed crossing a road east of Wellington, just west of Florida’s Turnpike and south of Southern Boulevard, about 3.5 miles south of Grassy Waters Preserve.
Miami-Dade County
Aug. 10, 2025, a large python found perched in a tree next to a pond in Cutler Bay.
July 12, 2025, a python photographed on a driveway, slithering under a parked car.
June 23, 2025, a python hidden in a yard adjacent to Trump National Doral Miami golf course.
May 27, 2025, a python found behind a hotel in Hialeah, along a canal that runs from the Everglades to the Miami River.
May 18, 2025, a python spotted in a Cutler Bay housing development adjacent to a mangrove preserve and Biscayne Bay.
May 06, 2025, a python spotted in Tamiami (Miami’s western suburbs), in a backyard next to a retention pond abutting Florida’s Turnpike.
Suburban Sequence
In previous years, Burmese pythons have turned up in Broward County near Nova Southeastern University’s Davie campus; in yards and industrial areas north and south of Fort Lauderdale Hollywood International Airport; in wooded parks in Dania Beach and as roadkill near Abundant Living Ministries in Southwest Ranches.
Miami-Dade County has had a similar series of sightings in developed areas. There were even sightings of two snakes swimming in Biscayne Bay south of Stiltsville, the cluster of cottages on stilts that stand up out of seagrass flats, a mile south of Key Biscayne and more than six miles from the mangrove forests around Matheson Hammock.
Palm Beach County has had fewer sightings in developed areas.
In essence, the suburban sightings are following the pattern of the snake’s invasion front moving north in the state, but with lag time.
According to EDDMapS data, prior to 2025, nearly all python sightings in Broward County were in wilderness preserves. Now pythons are showing up in Weston regularly. It makes sense that western suburbs would be the first to experience the invasion.
The farther south you go, the closer you get to the origin of the invasion, and the more time snakes have had to reach population capacity and look for new territory.
With time, the more northern suburbs of Broward and Palm Beach counties may see the same uptick Miami-Dade has.
Canal access
Pecori suspects the snakes are keying in on waterways. “I’m usually finding them within proximity of a water source, like a canal. My gut feeling is that they’re moving up through the waterway systems.”
Miller agrees. “What we’re finding with the python tracking that we’re doing is they follow the path of least resistance — pythons can move easier through water than they can on land, so it’s possible it traveled up a canal.”
If the snake came from the Everglades to the west, the shortest canal route jigsaw for 11 miles through Kendall to Pinecrest.
Coming in from the east, from the mangrove fringe of Biscayne Bay, where Fairchild, Matheson Hammock and the Deering Estate all offer habitat, would be easier.
Suburban snacks
As with coyotes, which have moved into suburban areas in Florida in recent years, pythons can prey on invasive Muscovy ducks, pigeons and iguanas, but also on native animals such as rats, raccoons, opossums, rabbits. They can also take feral cats and small pets.
“It’s not so much a risk to you or your family, but it is a risk to your domestic cat or small dog,” Pecori said.
And a big snake can survive on small food, Miller said. If there aren’t big meals around, a 14-foot snake would simply scale down and eat loads of rats and pigeons, she said.
As for the snake, Sgt. Atola brought it home, skinned it and used its meat as fishing bait, according to a Pinecrest Police Department spokesperson.
If you see a snake you think might be a Burmese python, think twice before trying to capture it yourself.
Though not venomous, larger snakes can be dangerous, and smaller pythons can easily be confused with native venomous snakes such as cottonmouths and eastern diamondback rattlesnakes.
Experts advise that you call the police as well as the IveGot1 hotline (888-483-4681), an exotic species hotline operated by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.
You also can use the IveGot1 app to contribute to the EDDMapS database, so your sighting gets verified by and expert, and logged.
Bill Kearney covers the environment, the outdoors and tropical weather. He can be reached at bkearney@sunsentinel.com. Follow him on Instagram @billkearney or on X @billkearney6.