Copper Head Snake 69 Inches

[gumbo2176]

Speaking of snakes. I have a friend of the family that at one time had a reticulated python as a pet. He got it when it was just a couple days old and even then, it was 2 ft. long. Over the years it grew to be close to 12 ft. long and easily over 100 lbs. as most snakes like this in captivity tend to be heavier than those in the wild.

At one time he had it living in a huge aquarium in his house but it outgrew that habitat and he hired me to build it an outside cage. I made it 8 ft. x 8 ft. x 5 ft. tall with a front made with wood framing around clear acrylic panels so you could see the snake. It also had a door for access. In one corner I built a sunken area 3 ft. x 3 ft. x 2 ft. deep and made it watertight for a small pool it could cool off in. I also put in a couple nice pieces of driftwood for it to crawl on and 2 heat lamps for when it got to be winter and too cool for it to live.

Unfortunately, a few years ago it got below freezing for a couple nights when they were away visiting relatives and there was a power outage in their neighborhood. The snake didn't make it, likely freezing to death since they are cold blooded and need a source of heat to survive when that cold.

[KitchenGardener]

....Sometimes people here have exotic pet snakes. We were at Denny's at 4 am (opening day of fishing) and the guy sitting at the booth behind me had a huge snake wrapped around his neck......

And they get loose sometimes!

Just a few weeks ago, I went into the kitchen to make a sandwich. I was standing at the counter slicing the bread when something out of the ordinary caught my eye. It was a snake hanging down in the corner below the cabinet. There was about 16 inches of him hanging down and he was slowly backing up, retreating upward. Obviously, he'd seen me first.

I stood back and called for my husband, but before he could get there, the snake was gone. I hunkered down a little and looked up under the cabinet and there was a hole in the wall where the bottom of the cabinet didn't quite meet the corner (nothing in this house is square, straight or level). I stuffed some paper into the hole to block that avenue of ingress.

Now, was the snake poisonous or not? I didn't get a look at his eyes; my only view was top-down as he was hanging down with the top of his head toward me, so I couldn't see if he had slit pupils. I spent the next week off and on looking at pictures of snakes native to Mississippi trying to identify him. No luck. Then it occurred to me that people have snakes as pets and sometimes they get loose, so I expanded my search. Bingo! It was a boa constrictor. Probably a young one; I'd guess about three feet long. At least it isn't poisonous.

Oh heck no, I'd pack up and move out of state! I'm just shell shocked...

[HoneyBerry]

(I just realized that my last response to this didn't go through. I remember typing it.)
I cannot imagine a snake indoors like what you describe. I think I would have to move out. I wonder if homeowners insurance would cover the motel expenses. It seems like a boa constrictor in the house would be a safety issue.

[Allyn]

I think it came in and was exploring when it crossed paths with me. This is an old one-room cabin on pillars. I'm sure there are plenty of gaps and crevices underneath that eventually led to the hole in the wall under the cabinets. I think once he saw that this isn't the best place to hang out (literally), he left. I know there are snakes under the house. My husband pulled a shed skin out from under the porch when he was pulling debris out from the previous resident. I startled a garden snake a few days ago that was sunning himself on a concrete pad in front of the laundry room. He beat a hasty retreat under the house. We have skinks, anoles, frogs and toads that live in/under/around the porch and occasionally find one in the house. As long as it isn't poisonous, I'm way okay with it as long as the snake stays out of the living quarters.

Now, I am concerned about the chickens with a constrictor in the neighborhood, but boas are usually nocturnal hunters and the chickens are locked in the coop at night. I'm honestly more worried about stray cats and roaming dogs than I am about snakes.

[Gary350]

I heard this on TV News. Some family had a pet boa constrictor in the house. One morning they find their 14 year old son dead the snake got loose during the night and killed him while he was asleep.

[Allyn]

I heard this on TV News. Some family had a pet boa constrictor in the house. One morning they find their 14 year old son dead the snake got loose during the night and killed him while he was asleep.

I can find no reports of that. Two young boys (5 and 7 yrs old) were killed in Canada by a snake that was incorrectly reported as a boa constrictor. It was actually a python. According to the Humane Society of the United States seventeen people have died from constrictor snake related incidents in the United States since 1978. Only one was from a boa constrictor and that person died of a Salmonella infection due to the bite, not being squeezed. The people squeezed to death were killed by pythons.

I'm not saying it isn't true. I just can't find any reports of that. If you have a link to the article, please share it.

[Gary350]

I heard this on TV News. Some family had a pet boa constrictor in the house. One morning they find their 14 year old son dead the snake got loose during the night and killed him while he was asleep.

I can find no reports of that. Two young boys (5 and 7 yrs old) were killed in Canada by a snake that was incorrectly reported as a boa constrictor. It was actually a python. According to the Humane Society of the United States seventeen people have died from constrictor snake related incidents in the United States since 1978. Only one was from a boa constrictor and that person died of a Salmonella infection due to the bite, not being squeezed. The people squeezed to death were killed by pythons.

I'm not saying it isn't true. I just can't find any reports of that. If you have a link to the article, please share it.

I saw that on TV a few months ago. It could have been a python is did not know there were other constrictor type snakes.

[Allyn]

I saw that on TV a few months ago. It could have been a python is did not know there were other constrictor type snakes.

Oh yes, there are many species of constrictor snakes that include boas, pythons and anacondas. I'm not a snake expert, but I believe boa constrictors are usually the smallest of the bunch -- typically less than 10 feet and less than 50 pounds. The man-killers are the really big snakes: green anacondas (up to 30 feet long, up to 500 pounds), Burmese pythons (up to 20 feet long, up to 400 pounds) and reticulated pythons (up to 25 feet long, up to 350 pounds).