I messed up big time with my baby bp

Last weekend I was holding my baby ball python in the car and then he slithered out from my hands and i was like okay cool, the car ride ends in 5 minutes, when it stops I'll grab him under the seat (passenger seat). Five minutes later he wasn't there!! We laid a trap with some mice and a heat source and kept checking the car every 20 minutes but he vanished. We looked everywhere in the interior but he vanished out of thin air. I thought maybe he found a way to the outside world and that was it. Boyfriend today (it's been a week) said that the snake died in the car because he can smell it but we still can't find it. HELP.

That is very unfortunate. Sorry to hear that.

There are many areas in a car that a snake can slither inside. Could be inside of the doors, in the undercarriage. In the dash.

If it isn't anywhere that YOU can reach, I'm afraid you will have to take it to a shop to be taken apart. Starting with the seats and then having the carpet taken out and so on.

Unless you can live with the smell, which will only get worse. I would take it in sooner then later, because if the smell gets really bad, you might have a hard time finding someone willing to work on that. Decomp is one of the worst smells there is...

Thanks for the reply, will that lower the value of the car in any way do you know?

Sorry to hear... there is a reason why everyone puts their snakes in sealed pillowcases and then in tubs when transporting in a car.

Wherever a snake can squash their head under, they can fit their whole body into. It's pretty amazing how much they can flatten themselves. Your baby BP could be anywhere, maybe even in the air conditioning vents.

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Originally Posted by sadpythonowner

Thanks for the reply, will that lower the value of the car in any way do you know?

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Regretfully, I think you already know the answer to that one. Going to be a long time before that stench leaves.

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Originally Posted by sadpythonowner

Thanks for the reply, will that lower the value of the car in any way do you know?

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Yes. Would you want to buy a car that smelled like that? Also if the snake is up against something absorbent like carpeting or upholstery for a seat, simply removing the carcass won't work, you'll be replacing the carpet or seat. Decomp stink just doesn't go away on its own.

If a snake is in a vehicle it needs to be secured in a bag, which is then secured in a bin. They are quick, sneaky, and will escape before you know it. Even my huge adult retics get bagged then binned for transport.

Ugggh, sorry to hear this. Sounds like a sad, smelly, expensive lesson learned.

What a shame, sounds like the one who originally needed help was the snake.. I don't doubt your upset about it, but how people are so laid back about these kinds of things I will never understand...
Now the OP's 1st Thread has turned into " i was irresponsible and im worried about a dead baby snake stinking up my car and loosing its resale value". Gotta love it.


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it's possible that what you smell is defecation and maybe, depending on where you live (how cold/hot it's getting), it's still alive. it's pretty easy for a snake to get into the inside of the front seats of most cars from underneath. I'd start looking in the seats. if the smell gets worse when you turn the heat on, then it's probably made it's way into the hat venting.

and sorry for suggesting it, but the notion that someone would let their snake loose in a car and go out of sight for even a minutes is kind of hard to believe, like, "is this a real story" hard to believe.

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Originally Posted by Slither Seeker

and sorry for suggesting it, but the notion that someone would let their snake loose in a car and go out of sight for even a minutes is kind of hard to believe, like, "is this a real story" hard to believe.

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I have to admit, I thought the same thing. That is just to a bit out there, esp. for a first post.

But who knows..

Im always wondering if people just want to get a rise out of ya.. Like the "is this a Corn Snake or a Burm" lmbo hahahah


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yeah, you never know, you don't want to hurt someone's feelings who is just too new to snakes to know any better but on the other hand you don't want to be taken for a fool either...

You are joking right . You know what you did was so irresponsible? What made you think he would just be sitting under the seat. Never mind, just remember there are consciences for every action. Good or bad.

I am rendered speechless. G-d Almighty.

Gee...you guys make it seem like I just didn't care. I'm a new ball python owner and I went out of my way to create an account here in hopes of seeing what to do after I made a horrible mistake. The car is not mine which is why I was making a big deal about it. You think I'm not devastated that my poor baby ball python is gone? I didn't see what good it would do to mourn him even further on the thread. So much for "friendliest online community" :'(

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Originally Posted by sadpythonowner

Gee...you guys make it seem like I just didn't care. I'm a new ball python owner and I went out of my way to create an account here in hopes of seeing what to do after I made a horrible mistake. The car is not mine which is why I was making a big deal about it. You think I'm not devastated that my poor baby ball python is gone? I didn't see what good it would do to mourn him even further on the thread. So much for "friendliest online community" :'(

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I don't know how much advice there is for anyone to give. The main focus here is keeping healthy animals. The cause of death is pretty obvious so there is no need to speculate on that. It's a sad situation. Not much else to say.

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Originally Posted by sadpythonowner

Gee...you guys make it seem like I just didn't care. I'm a new ball python owner and I went out of my way to create an account here in hopes of seeing what to do after I made a horrible mistake. The car is not mine which is why I was making a big deal about it. You think I'm not devastated that my poor baby ball python is gone? I didn't see what good it would do to mourn him even further on the thread. So much for "friendliest online community" :'(

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I'm sorry people jump to conclusions, but it is based on your posts and questions... Your first question was "the snake died in the car because he can smell it but we still can't find it. HELP." So we figure that he's already dead, and give suggestions on how to find the body/take the car apart.

Your next post was "will that lower the value of the car in any way?", so I think it's easy to jump to conclusions. :\

I think this is the friendliest snake community there is, but of course people here will feel disappointed when they see a new owner getting their snake killed out of carelessness and nothing else. It's an animal-loving community, after all.

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Originally Posted by sadpythonowner

Gee...you guys make it seem like I just didn't care. I'm a new ball python owner and I went out of my way to create an account here in hopes of seeing what to do after I made a horrible mistake. The car is not mine which is why I was making a big deal about it. You think I'm not devastated that my poor baby ball python is gone? I didn't see what good it would do to mourn him even further on the thread. So much for "friendliest online community" :'(

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You actually did get some advice on how to go about retrieving the body. And restoring the car.
Did you not see those replies ?
Did you appreciate the help?

If you get advice but only come back to ask a question whether a dead stinking animal body inside of a car will lower its value, well, people wonder.

Like I said before, its an unfortunate situation. Lesson learned.

The value of the car will definitely plummet unless you find and remove the dead body and any parts that liquids may have seeped into. Time if of essence. Your best bet is a garage that also does detailing. They will know how to remove seats and panels and carpets, to get to hard to reach areas. They usually also have experience in removal of filth and odors. The longer you wait, the worse it will get, though.

I'm not sure what else there is to say or do.

I wish you good luck, I'm sure your boyfriend is probably not thrilled, to say the least.

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Originally Posted by sadpythonowner

Last weekend I was holding my baby ball python in the car and then he slithered out from my hands and i was like okay cool, the car ride ends in 5 minutes, when it stops I'll grab him under the seat (passenger seat). Five minutes later he wasn't there!! We laid a trap with some mice and a heat source and kept checking the car every 20 minutes but he vanished. We looked everywhere in the interior but he vanished out of thin air. I thought maybe he found a way to the outside world and that was it. Boyfriend today (it's been a week) said that the snake died in the car because he can smell it but we still can't find it. HELP.

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To be fair, it seems like you did put some thought into coaxing him back out. What kind of trap and heat source did you use with the mice? Maybe the heat source was unnecessary and a distraction as well as disturbing the car too often to check. Snakes don't need to eat often so maybe he is still there.

Maybe the smell really is defecation.

Perhaps you can try the mice again without the heat source and give it more than 20 minutes this time as you will only frighten the baby python everytime you near or enter the car.

best case scenario: its poop you smell and the snake is still alive; worst case: your BF drives the rolling casket/stink-mobile as long as he can then sells it for scrap b/c NOTHING will get rid of that smell. Either way, i'd say your best bet is to remove and disassemble/de-upholster the seat it originally crawled under b/c it easily could have wedged itself into the foam and structural elements. Obviously you will need to completely replace the seat, but if that is actually the location of the tomb and/or toilet, the smell might just leave with it.

I keep hoping I'm reading this wrong because it sounds like not only was OP being irresponsible with their pet, they were being irresponsible on the road, and playing with their snake while driving.

If that's the case, I'm grateful the only thing that ended up dead was the snake.

If that seems like an over reaction, let me tell you about my day job: I am a third party liability claims reimbursement specialist. I work for hospitals all over the US. When a patient in one of our hospitals has been in an accident, I go to work figuring out who is responsible, seeing what insurances are available, if any, and working to bill them so our patients don't end up having to foot the bill themselves. The things I look at all day are ER bills and police reports.

Average single visit minimum ER bill is $1500 to $3000. That's for if nothing is wrong with you and the doc throws pain pills at you, pats your head, and sends you on your way.

I have worked accounts worth over a combined one and a half million dollars for a single accident. That's not even the highest we've had, just one I have personally touched.

(You might be happy to know everyone in that accident lived! You might be less happy to know that they were all young people who are now on permanent disability for the rest of their lives, including one person who ended up in a care facility to try to recover from brain damage. They were hit by a drunk driver at a 4 way stop.)

By far, the worst accident always involve drunk and/or distracted drivers. That has included things like, fiddling with the radio, looking down suddenly for something dropped, looking at a text. Quite often those accidents have a body count. So please, for the love of god, if you get a new animal, even just a puppy or a kitty, only ever transport it in a vehicle while it's properly secured in an appropriate carrier. I don't need the next police report I read to say the at fault party was distracted by playing with their pet ball python.

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Originally Posted by sadpythonowner

Gee...you guys make it seem like I just didn't care. I'm a new ball python owner and I went out of my way to create an account here in hopes of seeing what to do after I made a horrible mistake. The car is not mine which is why I was making a big deal about it. You think I'm not devastated that my poor baby ball python is gone? I didn't see what good it would do to mourn him even further on the thread. So much for "friendliest online community" :'(

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I'm sorry, but I have to take the side of the members who have commented below...

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Originally Posted by cletus

I don't know how much advice there is for anyone to give. The main focus here is keeping healthy animals. The cause of death is pretty obvious so there is no need to speculate on that. It's a sad situation. Not much else to say.

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Definitely a sad situation, as healthy animals are our top priority.

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Originally Posted by redshepherd

I'm sorry people jump to conclusions, but it is based on your posts and questions... Your first question was "the snake died in the car because he can smell it but we still can't find it. HELP." So we figure that he's already dead, and give suggestions on how to find the body/take the car apart.

Your next post was "will that lower the value of the car in any way?", so I think it's easy to jump to conclusions. :\

I think this is the friendliest snake community there is, but of course people here will feel disappointed when they see a new owner getting their snake killed out of carelessness and nothing else. It's an animal-loving community, after all.

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I have to agree that the OPs question so quickly and seamlessly changing to concern about the re-sale value of the car was pretty unfortunate and certainly gives the indication that the car's value is more important than the LIFE of the snake...

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Originally Posted by zina10

You actually did get some advice on how to go about retrieving the body. And restoring the car.
Did you not see those replies ?
Did you appreciate the help?

If you get advice but only come back to ask a question whether a dead stinking animal body inside of a car will lower its value, well, people wonder.

Like I said before, its an unfortunate situation. Lesson learned.

The value of the car will definitely plummet unless you find and remove the dead body and any parts that liquids may have seeped into. Time if of essence. Your best bet is a garage that also does detailing. They will know how to remove seats and panels and carpets, to get to hard to reach areas. They usually also have experience in removal of filth and odors. The longer you wait, the worse it will get, though.

I'm not sure what else there is to say or do.

I wish you good luck, I'm sure your boyfriend is probably not thrilled, to say the least.

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Yup, sad. Members offer condolences and advice on how to find the unfortunate mistake and the OP is all hurt that members are pointing out the carelessness that killed this poor animal, and we are also living in the real world where the death of an animal is heartbreaking and the value of the vehicle is secondary.

Per your post, the baby snake is dead with a known cause of death. There's nothing left for a snake forum to give advice on. If it turns out you've misidentified the smell and the snake is alive, I'm sure people would be thrilled to help. The question of your car's value and how to take it apart to remove a dead animal is better asked to an auto forum. People here are less likely to have interest or knowledge in disassembling car interiors. People here would also mostly have started asking how to pull it apart to find the snake before it smelled dead, as shown by all the "I pulled my couch apart to find my snake" posts. The only thing left right now for a snake forum would be sympathy for a snake killed by your mistake, which you've said you don't want.

Tl;dr: ask an auto forum if you want to know about car values. Come back if you have any actual snake-specific questions.

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Originally Posted by sadpythonowner

Last weekend I was holding my baby ball python in the car and then he slithered out from my hands and i was like okay cool, the car ride ends in 5 minutes, when it stops I'll grab him under the seat (passenger seat). Five minutes later he wasn't there!! We laid a trap with some mice and a heat source and kept checking the car every 20 minutes but he vanished. We looked everywhere in the interior but he vanished out of thin air. I thought maybe he found a way to the outside world and that was it. Boyfriend today (it's been a week) said that the snake died in the car because he can smell it but we still can't find it. HELP.

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i'm sorry for your lost. it's a real hard lesson for u to learn but what was your baby BP doing in the car anyway? did u take him out and about with u regularly? BP's esp. babies are shy and can become very stressed if they cannot find a cozy place to hide. it sounds like that was the first thing your baby BP did when he got the chance. it's unfortunate u were unable to find him in time. :(