Found snake, have questions.

[Sean]

Hi all. My 10 year old son has 2 BP's bought from snake dealers. Our neighbor across the street found one in her garage which she very promptly gave to us. It's about 15 inches. We fed it today, small rat, which was eaten quickly. It takes handling easy. Now, about disease, anything I should look for or do? A few scales feel out of place and a few scratches. We know all the kids in the neighborhood, and everyone knows Sean has snakes, so it is not a snake from here. We feel that it was either let loose here or has spent some time loose getting here. We live in West Palm Beach, FL. Any comments or help will be gratefully appreciated. Thanks.

[Shrap]

I would most certainly house it in another room away from your current snakes for now. A trip to the vet and a fecal would be a good idea as well.

[pumba]

Wow. that is interesting. You should keep your eye out for more. In south Florida, it is not unheard of to find adult pythons learking around. Most come from folks that got tired of them so decided to cut them loos in the wild. The thing is that in southern Florida, the weather is not exactly bad for the snakes. I have a guy that works for me now that retired from Miami Dade, and he was telling me a while back that they were allways finding big snakes in culverts, or wooded areas, or in garages ect. It may not be out of the question that there is more babies out there hatched in the wild.

Adam or someone else in here with more experience would probably know the chances of that better than me, but If I understand correctly, a 15 inch B/P in only a few months old. You may have more popping up in your neighborhood. One can never tell..

Cheers
Ray

[daniel1983]

Yep a 15 in. long ball python is usually around 1-2 months old.

[PrincessErica]

I've heard that especially in Florida, a lot of people buy bigger breeds of snakes without doing research, and when they get too big to care for, they just let them go in the wild. So since apparently there are quite a few burms, retics, etc. around Florida, it's definitely not surprising to hear that some balls have met the same fate. That's just so irresponsible though, it makes me very sad. I'm glad someone who knows what they're doing found it and is going to be able to save it.