Reptile & Amphibian Forums

About five months ago, our little-bitty Texas rat snake with a big-bad snake attitude vanished. Cage must not have been latched.

We tore up the snake room, and the surrounding rooms to no avail. I was worried that if he had made it into the bathroom across the hall, he might be gone for good. That room has a door to the outside, and was at that time missing the threshold plate on the bottom. He was small enough to get out under the door.

After months, I stopped talking about finding him.

Tonight my husband was in the bathroom, which is still being remodeled, and out of a hole in the wall where the toilet paper holder used to reside came the snake, all p!ss and vinegar for attitude and not less than three inches longer than he was back when he disappeared!

We're both amazed and tickled.

Wow, were you lucky! Too often I find little mummies of tree frogs and geckos that come in through the doors at night. Just the other day, I found a red eared slider hatchling that had somehow escaped its stocktank in the yard and was missing for roughly a year, although my fence has lanscaping edging blocking any escape routes except gaps in the gate which I had assumed he'd long slipped through. His shell was white and eaten to the bone by a fungal infection I'd been treating him for when he was given to me and his skin dry and eyes shut and wholly appeared to be shuffling off this mortal coil until a warm water soak and he began eating and swimming an hour later. Herps are amazing.