You know the old adage, “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure?” Sometimes there’s truth to that. There’s no telling what some people will throw out that’s seemingly worth something much greater to another person. But in the pantheon of things that have been dumped in the trash, who would throw away a living, 20-foot long python? That’s the question Teresa Sanchez is asking after she found the snake outside an apartment complex.
On Tuesday, August 5th, Sanchez was pulling into the Piero Apartment complex when she saw what looked like a large toy snake in the dumpster outside the complex.According to her, she got closer to investigate only to find out the snake was real, and alive. Realizing the potential risk an animal of this kind poses to smaller animals, and potentially kids, she started making calls to animal control and the police. The former didn’t answer, the latter said they couldn’t help. Apparently LAPD isn’t trained to handle dumpster pythons.
As it turns out, the real danger was to the snake itself. As Sanchez continued trying to find help, another onlooker realized that the snake looked to be in poor health with a severely swollen mouth. The search than began to find someone who would help with the snake but also wouldn’t make any effort to euthanize it. That help finally came in the form of Joseph Hart of SoCal Reptile Hunter. The snake was safely picked up but at this time we don’t have any further updates on its health.
Pythons are not native to California, hell they’re not really even native to the United States outside of Florida, where the Burmese Python is considered an invasive species.The sad likelihood is this may have been an exotic pet that was attempted to be disposed of in an inhumane way. We hope that’s not the case, snakes deserve better than a fate like this. We wish the little guy the best in his recovery.
