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Registration starts Thursday for the annual Python Challenge. The state last held a hunt for the invasive Burmese Python back in 2013.

In that hunt, 68 pythons were wrangled, the longest 14 feet, three inches. The snake is native to India and China, and wildlife officials think they started populating the Everglades and south Florida back in the 80’s.

Training to spot and handle a python will be mandatory for the hunt, which will run from mid-January to Valentine’s Day.

Captured pythons will be humanely put down and their carcasses studied for future management efforts.