NEW ORLEANS- The U.S. Geological Survey says a disease that causes high death rates in some kinds of snakes has been confirmed for the first time in Louisiana.
    
Ecologist Brad Glorioso says Louisiana is the 16th state where snake fungal disease has been found.
    
He says Louisiana's first case is one of the few documented in this country in a juvenile snake. Glorioso says that's worrying, because deaths of many juveniles could devastate snake populations.
    
The snake was found in the Cypress Island Preserve near Lafayette.
    
Glorioso and another Geological Survey scientist, Gabrielle Bodin, have begun checking for the fungus on every snake they can capture at a state park in Abbeville.