OTTAWA CITIZEN (Ontaruio) 05 March 11 Snake in a drain: Python surprises Gatineau woman in her bathroom (Tony Lofaro)

Ottawa: A baby Royal python has found a new home after it slithered out of the owner’s Gatineau apartment and into another tenant’s bathroom one floor below.

Now the owner says he’s deciding whether to keep the wandering snake. Meanwhile, an employee of the Outaouais SPCA in Gatineau has taken the 2 -foot snake to her home while the owner mulls over the issue.

“I’m still thinking about whether to get it or leave it there,” said Pierre-Paul Trottier, the snake’s owner, who lives in an apartment building on Robinson Street.

“I’m getting totally stressed out about this at the moment because of the situation,” Trottier said Friday when asked about why he hadn’t claimed the snake.

Trottier said he was concerned that the building’s landlord wanted to talk to him about the snake, especially in the wake of publicity after the snake went AWOL a week ago.

“He’s probably going to be upset about this,” said Trottier, a federal public servant who has owned the snake for several months. He also owns two cats.

A week ago, the snake found its way into the bathroom of Geneviève Beriault’s apartment. It’s unclear if the snake went through the pipes or an open door in the apartment building.

Beriault wasn’t expecting the slippery visitor when she went into her bathroom last Friday night.

“Obviously I was really scared when I saw the snake,” said Beriault, who at that point on Friday didn’t know that the snake belonged to Trottier.

After she found the snake slithering around shampoo bottles, Beriault immediately called 911. The police arrived and the SPCA was contacted; it sent an animal control inspector to capture the snake in a net.

In the week after the snake went missing, Trottier never contacted the Gatineau SPCA to claim it, said Karine Dunnigan, supervisor of the Gatineau shelter.

She said one of the SPCA employees had taken in the snake and wanted to adopt it permanently, unless Trottier wanted it back.

Caroline St. Jean, a SPCA employee, said the baby python would be a welcome addition to her home.

“I like snakes, and I’m not afraid of them. Even if I have to give it up, I might go out and buy another one,” said St. Jean, who also has a dog.

In the past 15 years, the shelter has only received two other snakes, Dunnigan said.
Python surprises Gatineau woman in her bathroom

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• ON Press: Snake in a drain - W von Papine�u, Mon Mar 7 05:50:47 2011