I've had a chocolate ball python for a few months, and it recently escaped by somehow knocking off part of the backing on it's enclosure. He's been out for ~36 hours now and I can't find him anywhere. My room is the warmest in the house and he's displayed quite a bit of interest in my rats(which are too big for him to eat, and I'm pretty sure he can't enter their cage) so I don't think he's out in rest of the house, but I'm at a loss as to how to re-capture him. The folks are worried because we have cats, but I can't imagine a two foot ball doing much to a cat, I'm more worried about the cats finding him to be honest.

Has anyone else ever had to deal with this? I can't afford a commercial trap right now or that would have been my go-to, any kind of help would be appreciated, I just want to find the snake before it ends up as cat food or figures out a way into my rat's enclosure.