Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Columbia, SC
Yesterday I was getting some skeletons out of the attic to get ready for Halloween. I took one of them outside to start painting it and noticed a small piece of snake skin inside the rib cage. Can you tell anything about the snake from the skin? I can take a pic and post it if it would help. It's a small piece.

There were some rat droppings up in the attic so I know there's snake food up there. If I can get rid of the rats, will the snake just go away? And with the cooler weather on it's way, and if the snake gets stuck up there during the winter, can it live through the winter or will it die and stink?
Thanks!

>>Columbia, SC
>>Yesterday I was getting some skeletons out of the attic to get ready for Halloween. I took one of them outside to start painting it and noticed a small piece of snake skin inside the rib cage. Can you tell anything about the snake from the skin? I can take a pic and post it if it would help. It's a small piece.
>>
>>There were some rat droppings up in the attic so I know there's snake food up there. If I can get rid of the rats, will the snake just go away? And with the cooler weather on it's way, and if the snake gets stuck up there during the winter, can it live through the winter or will it die and stink?
>>Thanks!

It would be difficult at best to try to identify a snake from a photo of a small patch of shed skin.

However, considering where you live and the fact that if the shed was found in the attic, my guess would be that it's from a Rat Snake. They are completely harmless; nothing to worry about. It's not going to get stuck in the attic and die. If it got in, it can get out. Believe me. Rat Snakes are difficult to keep in when you're trying to.
-----
We do not inherit the Earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children. Ralph Waldo Emerson

You're probably right in that it is a rat snake. By the size of the scales on the skin, he's not very big...maybe 1 1/2 feet. I'll try to remember he's scared of me each time I go up there. I'll walk really heavy so it'll give him a little more incentive to go hide somewhere! I know NOT to kill him. He's getting rid of those rats for me! Thank you for your time and patience.

the snake ends up eating too big of a meal. Then it might not be able to make it back out for a while (depending on the size of the opening it came in from) haha.
-----
Andy Maddox
AIM: thekingofproduct
MSN: Poloboy32486@hotmail.com
Yahoo:surfandskimtx04
Houston Herp Key
The Reptizone

"Some things will never change. They just stand there looking backwards. Half-unconsious from the pain. They may seem rearranged. In the backwater swirling. There is something that'll never change-The Meat Puppets"

Yeah, funny! We have an overgrown Pomegranate tree whose branches are up against the roof. We had the eaves taken down in the spring and I think he climbed up the tree and into the attic that way. After the tree finishes dropping it's fruit we have to cut it because it's in the way of telephone lines. I hate to cut it for fear that I'll be taking away the snake's escape route!

We had a pueblan milk get out of his cage in my shop once and it got through the bars into a dwarf hamster cage, ate the hamster and couldn't fit back through the bars