PROF STUDIES PET
Python takes weekly slither on campus
By Ralph Sanchez
Staff Writer
"I wouldn't keep a poisonous snake anywhere," said James El-lern, director of the organic chemistry labs, as he stared at "Ponch, the Friendly Snake."
Resting inside its glass cage in Stabler Science Hall, Ponch is a
15-foot, 70-pound python that serves as Ellem's pet and source of study. And in Ellem's view it is absolutely harmless.
"This one won't even counter-attack," Ellern said. "If you poke at it, it tucks its head to get away."
Ponch received some notoriety when secretaries at the chemistry and physics offices saw Ellern walking the snake on top of Stabler Hall. It has become a common weekly sight, according to one secretary at Stauffer Hall across the way from Stabler, to see Ellern with Ponch wrapped around him, clattering on top of the roof.
There has been more than one occasion when the snake has gotten away and taken excursions of its own around the building. But Ellern said it is very domesticated and harmless and it always comes back.
Ponch is a python which comes from Southeast Asia. "I got him at a pet shop," Ellern recalled. Pythons are not native to anywhere in America and are a subgroup of boa constrictors. Ellern keeps records on Ponch, checking how much he eats, how much he weighs and how much he grows.
The top length of a male python is around 15 feet. But the Los Angeles Zoo has three female pythons that are more than 20 feet long and weigh 150 pounds each.
Ellern said it is not dangerous to keep Ponch at Stabler for observation. He explained that stories about python's attacks on humans are "fantasies." In fact", Ellern tried to teach him to strike in self-defense, but the snake wouldn't even do that.
So Ponch subsists on a diet that Ellern provides of rats, mice, small rabbits and even medium-sized chickens. Like all other
constrictors, it swallows its food whole. "Its teeth are solely for grasping. It can't rip food apart," Ellern said.
In nature, and not in captivity, a python is a small mammal and bird-eater. Some have been known to eat small alligators. The reason they can swallow their food whole is that the width of their neck (and body) can dilate four to five times its original size.
To detect warm blooded animals snakes have heat-sensors in their lips which detect the warmth and act very much like an infra-red sensor.
Ponch has not eaten since September of last year. That is not unusual, since Ellem said constrictors have gone on record of not having eaten for periods over two years. Ponch does, however,
drink a milk shake once every two weeks. Ellem explained that the snakes can get away with long periods of noneating because they are creatures of low metabolism.
Constrictors have been used as meat-eaters to rid households of pests in some countries. Ellern described how a family in Cuba deliberately turned the snake loose to eat rats and mice living around the house.
Some constrictors like to dwell in cities where predators of the snake tend to be absent. But the snakes are not often seen in the city even though they are basically unshy. A coral snake, by comparison, is a shy creature that stays away from populated areas and lives in swamps.
Ellern said that the number of (continued on page 10)
DT photo by St»v« Hyman
SERIOUS READING—An unidentified student is shown in the Student Activities Center, deeply engrossed in a story from a recent Daily Trojan.
Spring enrollments decline at slower rate than usual
By Randy Oliver
Staff Writer
Enrollments are traditionally lower in the spring than in the fall — but this year the difference is less than usual.
"Enrollment for this spring is closer to the fall enrollment than it has been for a number of years, because of many new and continuing students," said James Jones, executive director of stuc'- . administrative services.
Jones said enrollment was approximately 25,500 during the 16th week of fall semester and 25,288 during the 7th week of the spring semester.
"The spring figure is a bit soft from the standpoint that some students have not settled their fee bills," Jones said. "That figure will fluctuate some. There will be some drop but I can t say now how large it will be."
Veronica Tincher, head of information services for the Office of Institutional Studies, said the figures might be deceiving.
"It could be a very good year, but I don't expect it to be that good," she said.
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Truman Capote brings works to life in Bovard
When 17-year-old Truman Capote went for his first job interview at New Yorker, the receptionist said to the managing editor, "There's a little boy out here who says he's here to see Mr. Shawn?"
Capote, who said he looked about 10 years old at the time, spoke about the beginnings of his career as a writer and read three of his stories Thursday in Bovard Auditorium.
The author of In Cold Blood — a true story of a multiple murder and its consequences — was born in New Orleans, La., and spent his childhood there and in a small, rural town in Southern” Alabama.
Capote said he came from a large, elderly family and led a somewhat isolated childhood. An elderly cousin taught him to read when he was four years old. Four years later he began writing.
He said he entered a writing contest sponsored by a newspaper called the Mobile Register when he was
eight. Although he did not wm the contest, the newspaper published his story about his next-door neighbors.
Capote did not elaborate on the contents of the story, but said, "It was very literal. It caused a great uproar in the town. The neighbors didn't speak to my family for something like 27 years."
When he was 16 Capote sent a story to New Yorker. The magazine published the story, which was called My Side of the Matter. Capote proceeded to read aloud this story about "a seriously paranoid boy."
The next year saw two more of his stories published in Neu> Yorker and a job offer to come to New York City and write for The Talk of the Town section of the magazine.
Though the editors were hesitant about hiring a writer who was only 17 and looked even younger, Capote was placed on staff. He still writes for the magazine today.
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TRUMAN CAPOTE
trojan
Volume LXXVI, Number 43	University of Southern California	Friday, April 20, 1979
Criticism prompts tight itemizing of indirect costs of research grants
By Sean Dunnahoo
Staff Writer
Federal guidelines for the gathering and allocation of indirect costs have been revised due to criticism over the way universities manage taxpayers' funds for research and development.
Faculty members would have to estimate their effort distributions in a survey each semester as opposed to once a year at present.
The guidelines, designated A-21, will go into effect Oct. 1,1979 and replace the old documents that dictated how universities allocate indirect costs and administer federal grants.
University faculty and staff will be required to itemize time spent on each aspect of their jobs by documenting the amount of time and effort that could be considered indirect costs incurred as a result of the performance of contracts and grants.
In the past, the office of Cost Analysis used generally accepted cost accounting procedures in making approximations for the itemization of time spent
on research projects. The difference now is that the office has to expand its documentation to include additional employees of the university, a spokesman for the office said.
The major impact of the new guidelines is an increased administrative burden of paperwork in academic areas.
The extra surveys would require additional costs for development of the frequent surveys and tabulation of the information. Much of the expense will probably be for the development of a computer system to do the tabulation.
The office of Cost Analysis will be issuing a release to the university within two weeks outlining the new requirements and explaining the documentation processes to faculty and staff members.
Tne A-21 guidelines were first formulated last year, but the nation's universities and colleges complained about many of the points, and it was rewritten and presented this year.
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