Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Ok, so I messed up Saturday morning while changing out my blue beauty's water and left the top off of his cage for a whole 3 minutes and he got out. He's in a 55 gal aquarium and he's about 4 feet long right now. Normally, he's very content to just hang out while I do this, but he must've been sizing up the situation and climbed up his branches and hauled butt in no time flat while I had my back turned. My snake room is actually my garage and his cage is in the far back right corner, up on a counter. I figured, how far could he have possibly gone in such a short time, right? Well I looked for a good two hours in every little nook and cranny I thought he could've got into. No luck. Just vanished into thin air. Also in my snake room/garage, there is a small closet in the far, front left corner. About as far away as you can get from his cage in my 2.5 car garage. So, after giving up and just hoping to catch him out in the open in the future, I had some lunch and then went to the movies with my wife and daughter. When we got back, I decided to go check the closet, again, and lo and behold, there he is, on the second shelf up just sitting there staring at me. The really crazy thing about this is that on two other occasions, I have made stupid mistakes that led to other rat snakes (a big male yellow as well as a very large female tiger) getting out and they have all ended up in the same closet! There are a million places in that garage they could go (under/behind other cages, under/behind washer/dryer/refrigerator, etc.) and they all end up in this one closet. Very weird, but if there are ever any future escapes, I will know just where to look.

PS - pics are from about a year ago when I first got him - he's easily doubled in size.

so you forced your snake to "come out of the closet"? you should allow them to "come out" when they are ready.

sorry... I had to.
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1.0.0 Great Plains Ratsnake
1.0.0 Corn, Lavender Aztec het for Amel
0.1.0 Black Ratsnake
0.0.1 Texas Rat (tame)
1.0.0 Broad Banded Water Snake, Hypo
1.0.0 Black Bassador Retriever
2.1.0 Godchildren, 1 Evil, 2 possible hets

...too funny.

>>so you forced your snake to "come out of the closet"? you should allow them to "come out" when they are ready.
>>
>>sorry... I had to.
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>>1.0.0 Great Plains Ratsnake
>>1.0.0 Corn, Lavender Aztec het for Amel
>>0.1.0 Black Ratsnake
>>0.0.1 Texas Rat (tame)
>>1.0.0 Broad Banded Water Snake, Hypo
>>1.0.0 Black Bassador Retriever
>>2.1.0 Godchildren, 1 Evil, 2 possible hets

That would make the snake "homo" for an undesireable trait then, correct?..hahaha!

Seriously though,....glad you found it. Yes, initially I've also found that snake's tend to follow the perimeter along walls, rather than crossing open floor space until they find the color black, which to the snake means dark cover and seclusion.

After 41 years of owning snakes , I often find myself sometimes "thinking" like one..LOL!

best regards, ~Doug
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"Better to be silent and thought a fool, than to open mouth and remove any doubt!"

>>Ok, so I messed up Saturday morning while changing out my blue beauty's water and left the top off of his cage for a whole 3 minutes and he got out. He's in a 55 gal aquarium and he's about 4 feet long right now. Normally, he's very content to just hang out while I do this, but he must've been sizing up the situation and climbed up his branches and hauled butt in no time flat while I had my back turned. My snake room is actually my garage and his cage is in the far back right corner, up on a counter. I figured, how far could he have possibly gone in such a short time, right? Well I looked for a good two hours in every little nook and cranny I thought he could've got into. No luck. Just vanished into thin air. Also in my snake room/garage, there is a small closet in the far, front left corner. About as far away as you can get from his cage in my 2.5 car garage. So, after giving up and just hoping to catch him out in the open in the future, I had some lunch and then went to the movies with my wife and daughter. When we got back, I decided to go check the closet, again, and lo and behold, there he is, on the second shelf up just sitting there staring at me. The really crazy thing about this is that on two other occasions, I have made stupid mistakes that led to other rat snakes (a big male yellow as well as a very large female tiger) getting out and they have all ended up in the same closet! There are a million places in that garage they could go (under/behind other cages, under/behind washer/dryer/refrigerator, etc.) and they all end up in this one closet. Very weird, but if there are ever any future escapes, I will know just where to look.
>>
>>PS - pics are from about a year ago when I first got him - he's easily doubled in size.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>

One time I lost my Taiwan Beauty snake. Found him in my under ware drawer
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My collection
1.0.0 Normal Taiwan Beauty Snake
1.1.0 Normal Black Rat Snake
1.0.0 White-sided Black Rat Snake
1.0.0 Anery Corn Snake
1.0.0 Amel Corn Snake
1.0.0 Normal Common Garter Snake
0.1.0 Hypo Northern Water Snake
0.0.8 red spotted newts

Many years ago, I forgot I left the lid off one of my young adult Honduran Milksnakes(approx 4 ft.). She escaped, and about two months later, I found her coiled up in the huge front pocket of some shorts I grabbed and was about to put on from the laundry basket sitting on my bedroom floor.......for a second there, I absolutely FREAKED!!!!....I've had many hundreds of snakes in my day, but a big giant softball-sized wad of snake wasn't exactly what I was expecting when I went to grab my shorts that morning..LOL!

After the hair on the back of my neck went back down, I was totally over-joyed to have found her again, as she was one of my very favorite snakes at the time.

~Doug
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"Better to be silent and thought a fool, than to open mouth and remove any doubt!"

I had a yellow rat snake escape when I was 14.

I found him crawling out my bedroom basement window on my 21st birthday.

That beat being old enough to buy alcohol any day!!!

Yeah we had mice in the house for sure, I used to see them once in awhile but it never dawned on me that snake could live that long in the house. He was several feet bigger when I caught him. I also had a nice black rat escape too, caught him two years later in the back yard on the basement walk in doorway eating a sparrow!!!

Since I live in NJ it was the same yellow rat snake for sure and the black rat was quite distinct and the same one as well, I have never seen a black rat in NJ as of yet. I know they are here but there are none in my vicinity that I have seen, too many people and it is in central NJ. I here most are abundant North and south of me in the state.

>>Many years ago, I forgot I left the lid off one of my young adult Honduran Milksnakes(approx 4 ft.). She escaped, and about two months later, I found her coiled up in the huge front pocket of some shorts I grabbed and was about to put on from the laundry basket sitting on my bedroom floor.......for a second there, I absolutely FREAKED!!!!....I've had many hundreds of snakes in my day, but a big giant softball-sized wad of snake wasn't exactly what I was expecting when I went to grab my shorts that morning..LOL!
>>
>> After the hair on the back of my neck went back down, I was totally over-joyed to have found her again, as she was one of my very favorite snakes at the time.
>>
>>
>> ~Doug
>>-----
>>"Better to be silent and thought a fool, than to open mouth and remove any doubt!"
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Roberts Realm Of Reptile Research
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Thanks,

I opened my mouth and out flowed a melody black.

Wow thats amazing, they always find a way to survive don't they.

My story isn't as amazing but kind of funny. My 1st snake I ever had was a male snow corn, one night I left his enclosure open by accident an I left. I can home to find it slightly open and he was gone, I thought I lost him because he wasn't very big only about 20". Well luckily that night was the night before feeding day and he was hungry and that very night I hear my baby leopard geckos screaming and hissing and sure I enough found him on the other side of the room trying to get into my leopard geckos enclosure to join them for dinner. Luckily no snakes or geckos were hurt this night lol.

I have found a few in the bottom of the furnace in the basement a few times over the past 30 years

>>Wow thats amazing, they always find a way to survive don't they.
>>
>>My story isn't as amazing but kind of funny. My 1st snake I ever had was a male snow corn, one night I left his enclosure open by accident an I left. I can home to find it slightly open and he was gone, I thought I lost him because he wasn't very big only about 20". Well luckily that night was the night before feeding day and he was hungry and that very night I hear my baby leopard geckos screaming and hissing and sure I enough found him on the other side of the room trying to get into my leopard geckos enclosure to join them for dinner. Luckily no snakes or geckos were hurt this night lol.

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=========================================================
Roberts Realm Of Reptile Research
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Thanks,

I opened my mouth and out flowed a melody black.

I've had a couple of tri-colors (Milk & scarlet) not ratsnakes, that got out & were never seen again. Since one was a L. triangulum connanti I was pretty upset. . And a few days ago, my WC Texas Garter turned into an amusing toy for a Jack Russell terrier. RIP Stripe.

Matthew

>>I've had a couple of tri-colors (Milk & scarlet) not ratsnakes, that got out & were never seen again. Since one was a L. triangulum connanti I was pretty upset. . And a few days ago, my WC Texas Garter turned into an amusing toy for a Jack Russell terrier. RIP Stripe.
>>
>> Matthew
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=========================================================
Roberts Realm Of Reptile Research
=========================================================
Thanks,

I opened my mouth and out flowed a melody black.

> "I had a yellow rat snake escape when I was 14.

I found him crawling out my bedroom basement window on my 21st birthday".

** HAHA!!..man!,....that's INSANE!.. yes, it had to be the same one for sure!, since they range WELL south of NJ.

Too funny!

~Doug
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"Better to be silent and thought a fool, than to open mouth and remove any doubt!"

I was very happy and extremely shocked at the same time, plus it made my 21 birthday very rememberable since drinking was no big deal cause I was already doing that LOL!

It mat have been before I was 14 as well.

>>> "I had a yellow rat snake escape when I was 14.
>>
>>I found him crawling out my bedroom basement window on my 21st birthday".
>>
>>
>> ** HAHA!!..man!,....that's INSANE!.. yes, it had to be the same one for sure!, since they range WELL south of NJ.
>>
>> Too funny!
>>
>>
>> ~Doug
>>-----
>>"Better to be silent and thought a fool, than to open mouth and remove any doubt!"
-----
=========================================================
Roberts Realm Of Reptile Research
=========================================================
Thanks,

I opened my mouth and out flowed a melody black.

n/p
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"Better to be silent and thought a fool, than to open mouth and remove any doubt!"

Had a small bull snake escape once and after hours of searching I gave up. He escaped in the late summer. About 3 months after his escape I guess he got cold and started looking for warmth. I aoke in bed to a cold bull snake crawling across my stomach. I guess I knew what it was because as I jerked awake I was at the same time grabbing him.

Other cool escape find was a cal king. One of the hatchlings escaped from the temporary snake room in the house. I was in the construction phase of my snake building outside and after about 2 onths I finished it but lazily left some small pieces of wood lying around. That would laid around all winter and the following spring I finally decided to burn them off. The last piece of wood was about 6 inches square and when I picked it up, there laid the abbarent patterned Cal king. He was also much fater than when he escaped so apparently he was feeding well

dc

Bought a pair of greenish blond sub-oc babies from Lee Abbott at the 07 Daytona Expo. Within three weeks the female got out. After weeks of night patrolling the house at all hours, we gave up. Figured the kats ate it. Eight months later, Loraine gets up at 4:00 AM only to find the snake's head poking out from underneath one of the stove burners. It was fine (though very stunted) & immediately ate. It MAY have found moisture in the kats water bowl but can't imagine what she may have found to eat!

I've told this story here before but thought it was worth posting again.

When I first bought my current house I had 2.2 Rhynchophis boulengeri on loan from a good friend of mine. I had just pulled them out of brumation and set them up in a temporary rack in our new home. The rack was very long and one of the casters had broken off during the move so it had a significant curve in it and one of them was able to escape. R. boulengeri are valuable animals still but back then adults were really worth a lot. I was freaking out.

I can tell you that having a snake escape during a move is a less than ideal time. You have open boxes everywhere and things are constantly being moved from room to room so the snake could be anywhere. I tore the room the rack was in apart and could not find it. I was contemplating what to do next and realized I had not checked the other specimens to see if they had escaped.

Long story short, I found the male in the tub next to his copulating with the female. So he had escaped from his cage and managed to squeeze into the one containing the female. Needless to say I immediately took the other male and placed him in with the other female. I never saw that pair copulate but both females produced clutches several weeks later. It was the first breeding for all four specimens and I think we got 15 fertile eggs that year.

And for the record, the next thing I unpacked were some wood shims that I used to straighten out the sagging rack.
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Currently keeping:

6.10 Gonyosoma oxycephala (Javan, mixed colors)

1.1 Philodryas baroni

1.0 Rhodesian Ridgeback