A few days after a man and his friends came across a 4-foot python while fishing at a pond in Kenosha, Wisconsin, they were able to track down the snake on Wednesday night. A video of the encounter was posted on Facebook.
"This is crazy. I feel like I'm living in Florida all over again," the man said as he searched for the snake with his arm buried elbow-deep in a murky muskrat hole.
After searching for a moment, the man grabbed the snake and pulled it from the hole. He believed it had been someone's pet and either escaped or was dumped in the pond, according to WITI in Milwaukee.
Pythons are not native to Wisconsin and the cold winter likely would have killed the snake had it not been found. It was relocated to a loving home, the report said.
Pythons turning up where they're not expected is not uncommon. This month, a woman in London was shocked to discover a 5-foot python napping in a kitchen after likely entering the house through a hole in the wall.
The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) was called to capture the snake, and RSPCA animal rescue Officer Abigail Campbell said it's common for owners to dump pythons after they become too much of a responsibility.
"We believe many people are unaware of how much of a commitment these animals are when they take them on, and we suspect the reality of caring for them has become too much in these cases," Campbell told the British Broadcasting Channel.
Police officers in Kannapolis, North Carolina, were called when a ball python was spotted hiding in the engine of a parked car in September.
While some people view the snakes as pets, others see the invasive species as an annoyance that poses a threat to native species. In Florida, officials have permitted python hunting because the snakes inundate the state. Officials believed there are more than 100,000 pythons in Florida. Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission officers are authorized to euthanize wild pythons, which have been banned in Florida since 2021 because of their invasive nature.
Despite the efforts to mitigate the invasive species, sightings of pythons in bizarre places are somewhat common. Pythons, which are not venomous, kill their prey through constriction, or winding their body around their prey until it suffocates.
Newsweek reached out to University of Cincinnati professor and python expert Bruce Jayne by email for comment.
