A Miami family had a surprise, and unwelcomed, Christmas visitor: a 13-foot Burmese python in their swimming pool, according to news reports from South Florida.

Suladie Miranda found the snake "curled up in the corner of the pool" and called 911, WSVN-TV reports.

Miami-Dade Fire Rescue's "venom response" team responded. (Note: Pythons are not venomous.) It took three tries to nab the slithering intruder, which slipped away and went for a swim before being captured.

The snake was caged and taken to a farm in Homestead. Officials say it most likely had been someone's pet and either escaped or was set loose when the owner could not longer care for it.

As the Bradenton Herald notes, Burmese pythons are a problem in South Florida:

In the Everglades, and its surrounding farm and wild lands, a population estimated in the thousands has eaten everything from alligators to endangered wood rats. Two months ago, in the latest gruesome find, South Florida Water Management District workers captured a 16-footer swollen with a 76-pound deer inside. Florida wildlife managers have moved swiftly on the snake threat, last year effectively banning personal ownership of Burmese pythons and seven other constrictors as pets.

Although Florida has cracked down on the python trade, a proposed ban on the import and interstate sale of the Burmese pythons and eight other large exotic snakes has been "swallowed up in White House bureaucracy for nearly a year," The Miami Herald writes.

Despite the pressure, the effort to declare the snakes "injurious species" through a cumbersome administrative process called the Lacey Act remains in doubt. The proposal has been buffeted by surging anti-regulatory fervor in Washington and scientific controversy over whether the snakes really pose much of a risk beyond South Florida.

More on the python invasion here.