Snake Removal and Control in Seattle

Snake droppings - If you saw a snake in your yard, do not assume that you will soon be knee-deep in reptile droppings. Snakes excrete solid waste as often as they eat food, and that time frame can be days, weeks, or months depending on the snake. Even with numerous snakes on your property, you will not be encountering droppings in mass quantities. That being said, snake droppings are not like many droppings from other carnivores. Yes, you will have the fur, bones, and teeth that cannot be digested, but you also have a strange mixture of white urea and liquid excrement. Snakes have a cloaca, a single opening at the base of the tail for both liquid and solid elimination. This dual excrement means that snake droppings are usually a pile of soppy mush. It is often easier to try to figure out what animals could also leave similar droppings to the ones you have found. If you come across a more likely culprit, look at the region you found the droppings in. Rodents will not leave fecal material like a snake, so if the poop is found inside the home, you may have a snake inside.

This is a professional wildlife removal company based in Seattle Washington. We provide pest control for wild animals only, not extermination of insects. If you have nuisance critters that you need to get rid of, we can humanely take care of the problem. We very rarely deal with snake problems. If you live outside of the area, you can visit this site to purchase a snake trap or to learn more about snake repellents.

Here is a photo of my son, Collin, reaching for a harmless Garter Snake that I caught here in Seattle:

How To Get Snakes Out Of Your Yard

Snakes are naturally found in many states in the United States, and generally prefer to live in areas with warmer climates, but there are also many pet snakes that can escape in some areas. Many people will actually be petrified of snakes, so the best advice is to try and avoid the snakes until they can be identified and to verify that they are non-venomous. Snakes can get into a yard in many different ways, but gaps in fences or a space under a gate will often be the most common method of getting into a yard.

Identifying The Snake

If seeing a snake in your yard is a rare occurrence, then it is best not to approach it until you can identify the snake. It is worth noting that snakes are much more likely to be hiding in leaf litter or under a bush, and if the snake is motionless in the middle of a lawn or on a paved area of the yard, then it is possible that the snake is injured or disorientated. The first thing to do will be to check to see what kinds of snakes are native to your area, and to see if the snake in your yard matches the coloring. If you cannot identify the snake, or it is venomous, then you should call a snake removal expert to deal with it.

Because around eighty percent of snakes in North America are actually not venomous, there is a strong possibility that the snake in your yard is quite harmless. If the snake is motionless, then you may want to consider trying to place a box or plastic container over the snake, and removing it in this way. Snakes will not normally allow themselves to be caught in this way, and will normally leave the yard while trying to escape, so you may want to take the snake to a vet to check that it is healthy before it is released.

Using Snake Traps

If you do have a regular problem with a single snake returning to your yard, then you may want to set one of the snake traps in order to catch the snake. The most effective traps are those which have a sticky adhesive which will hold the snake in place, but you really should check these traps regularly to see if you have caught the snake. Once you have caught the snake then you should take it at least five miles away from your property to somewhere well away from other domestic properties before releasing it.

Reducing Your Yard’s Attractiveness To Snakes

There will often be a specific reason why the snakes are returning to your yard, and one of the best ways of reducing their visits is to make sure that the garden is not suitable as a snake habitat. This can involve some rather simple things such as removing leaf litter and keeping the grass trimmed which will provide less cover for the snake. If you do have an open wood pile kept in the yard or lots of low shrubs, these can also be good places for snakes to hide, so remove them if possible.

One of the main reasons for snakes to return to an area is if there are plenty of food sources there, so if you have mice or rats in the yard then this may be what is attracting the snakes. Setting traps to catch these animals and getting the rodents out of your yard will also mean that the snakes won’t want to return. If you do have cats or dogs, then giving them free reign to roam the yard may also scare off any snakes that are returning to your yard, though it is worth ensuring that the problem snakes are not venomous before doing this.