For Brad Lundsteen, owner of Suburban Wildlife Control, a typical dispatch-call involves finding and catching common suburban critters like squirrels and mice.
“My bread and butter are raccoons out of attics, skunks under houses,” he said.
“Snake in the car was definitely an unusual call.”
On Wednesday, a Geneva woman called him frantic saying a large snake slithered deep into her Toyota sedan. It was a ball python, about four-feet long, and it refused to come out.
“The minute the snake saw her, [it went] right up the undercarriage of the car and it was gone,” Lundsteen said. “It was wedged in a space this tight, wrapped around some parts.”
Lundsteen is a renowned wildlife catcher, but the snake was stiff, stubborn and held tight to the metal inside the vehicle. The smell under the car indicated the snake had nested there for quite some time.
“I started pulling and slowly got him out. It took me a half an hour. These guys, when they grab on, they are so strong,” he said.
Ball pythons are not native to Illinois, and are typically only found in their native habitat of Sub-Saharan Africa.
But they are often purchased as pets and that is the leading theory of how the snake got in the woman’s car. Her vehicle was recently purchased from out-of-state.
“I know the snake didn’t come from here obviously, so it just goes to show animals do get in and hitch rides,” Lundsteen said.
The snake and its journey to Illinois were the talk of the town, and documented for hiss-tory on the front page of the Daily Herald newspaper.
But now the python will have to trade-in its ride for a new, safer home. Lundsteen is working with nearby reptile rescue organizations to find it a permanent place to live.