Wow! What great stories. I just have a silly story. When we had our pet shops, we bred as much as we could. We had some large snakes that had off spring regularly but we also had these little 'Rough Green Snake'. They are native to the US and are sure cute. They thought they were King Kong. We had a trio and had eggs. We took the parents out and finally we babies. They also thought they were mini King Kongs. They were attracted to the others tails. One tried to eat the other one. It was killed. We separated the last two. They ate themselves into rings. They were all died. We expected we didn't feed them correctly but we had baby meal worms, crickets, and wax worms but that wasn't enough, I guess. BTW, we even bred our own feeder bugs so we could have any size meal worms, crickets and wax worms for our customers.
Amazing! I too once heard a lady constantly complain that her fish in the aquarium were eating their own young, (don't remember the fish type). So some advised her to immediately separate the young from the adults, as soon as you see one. This sure seemed to work in that lady's case - However she soon started complaining about lack of storage space, and so kept on borrowing glassware from all the neighbours. Anyway, long story short - One day her cats decided that they had been tortured enough. So they somehow toppled the aquarium and eat all the fish (young and old)! But this thread is all about snakes - So what I wrote above can be considered off topic. No problem, I'll correct it now with my own snake story! I was 15 or 16 at the time. Family was going out somewhere, so they asked me if I too would like to go? I said no thanks, as I was recovering from a flu (with a very badly clogged up nose)... So off they went, leaving me home alone. The time was around midday, and I too had nothing to do. So I switched on the TV and played with the satellite dish. However to clear my nose, I went to the bathroom. Over the sink I blew out my nose, and it created a hissing noise. And so immediately I heard another hissing sound, very similar to the sound that I made - But I could instantly tell that this could have only come from a cold blooded reptile! So instantly whatever I was taught about snakes (how to avoid or kill), started running in my mind. The sound of a snake was unmistakable, so I knew it was now in the same room as me - But I had no visual confirmation (yet). Therefore I first (without any sudden movements) glanced all around me. And when I was sure that I had a clear path to the door, I walked out calmly. Once outside the bathroom, I tried to close the door so that the snake couldn't get outside, but I think the laundry basket came in the way. Anyway, I didn't know what to do, so like a typical idiotic male teenager, I got my long rifle... I then waited outside the bathroom for the snake, however I soon realized that if the snake were to come outside, and if I am not able to kill it instantly with the butt of my rifle - There was a very good chance that the snake will hide somewhere else inside the home, and so will become impossible to locate. So inside the bathroom at least there are not many things where the snake will be able to hide. So my stupid teenaged logic dictated that I now had to move in for the kill. Of course, I could have now closed the door with the help of my rifle (moving the laundry basket out of the way), and sealed the bottom of the door with masking tape. After this I could have easily watched the door without any tension, and waited until my family would return. But wisdom of this magnitude is always nonexistent in the human male when he is in his mid teens... But here too, since I was taught a lot about snakes (specially when it came to killing them). I at least didn't jump blindly into it. So first I opened the door completely (increasing my view). After which, I reached inside where I knew the snake wasn't. So in this place I turned on the hot water - I remembered that whenever snakes are found indoors, it is often during midday, as they want to avoid the hot sun outside. So I decided to flood the entire bathroom floor with steaming hot water. It worked, and the snake soon showed itself to me! And that's when I realized what I was facing, and I also realized how stupid I had just been - As this was a foot and a half long jumper, a leaf nosed viper, extremely poisonous... The hot touched the snake, and so the snake was now really angry. So I again jumped out of the bathroom, and this time thankfully there was no guesswork at play - As now I had seen what kind of a snake it was, and I also knew it's exact location! I wanted to kill it now, but the snake was too smart for that, as it hid behind the WC (thus preventing me from hitting it with the buttof my gun). So now I waited outside, with the snake in my full view. The hot water by the way was continuing to run. Which made the snake more angry. But in that corner behind the WC, water would not reach. So I thought that the steaming hot flowing water will keep the snake from coming towards me. But this was a jumper, so while I sat just outside the bathroom door - About 7 to 8 feet away from the snake, I saw the snake back off and coil in the corner. After which it opened it's jaws and hissed for a long time. I at that moment wasn't sure about what to do next. But I had realized that now I only had a few seconds before the snake would jump straight at me - Yes, this was a tree climber and jumper, that could easily reach me. So just when the snaked jumped, I opened fire (without even bothering to aim)! Now here I would like to mention that firing such a heavy caliber weapon indoors (in a closed space) is totally unlike what you see in the movies. So for the first few seconds you lose all your senses, you really are totally deaf. And what's more is that inner ear balance is also off. So you also forget what way is up and what way is down. You really feel nothing except for some constant ringing in the ears... But when it all started to make sense again, I saw a headless snake's body (with it's tail twitching) very near my feet. Now exactly what happened in the air when I saw the snake jump at me, I have no memory of it. All I know is that I squeezed the trigger, without even having time to take proper aim. That anyway is my personal snake story. I laker did some investigation (as I needed to know how could a snake some up to the 2nd story window of the bathroom), and discovered that the snake had climbed the cold water pipe. Now I couldn't exactly do much about the plumbing - So the next best thing to do was close all the tiny gaps in the aluminium frame windows with silicon glue. As that's the only thing which will keep these creatures outside. And on the main doors on the ground floor as well, always place a thick strip of aluminium strip on the outside at the bottom of the door, and a rubber strip on the inside. Otherwise you're asking for trouble I swear...
