Some snakes have made their way onto people’s property

COLUMBUS, Miss. (WCBI)- The summer heat and recent heavy rains have some unwanted guests slithering into yards and gardens around the Golden Triangle. Snakes have popped up; sometimes where people would least expect them. This time of the year they’re part of the Southern landscape, and the experts say whether you love or hate them;  the main thing to remember is not to panic.

“Anytime we get a whole lot of rain or anything like that’s when I see them more than anything. Cottonmouth and copper heads are mainly the ones I usually get,” said Columbus’s animal control officer Donald Grey.

Grey said during June he had 3 calls about snakes on people’s property, but when he gets the call his first instinct isn’t to kill.

“I go in the house and make sure everybody’s out then I go in and find it and catch it put it in a five-gallon bucket and release it,” said Grey.

If anyone happens to see a snake around their yard or home and needs products to prevent them from showing up. They’re encouraged to visit their local hardware store.

“They buy either snake away which has different ingredients than the straight sulfur so sulfur used to be the common use and they sprinkle it around the perimeter of their house and I guess they sleep easy,” said Military Hardware employee Irving McCoy.

Mccoy said he saw several customers come in the store to get the commercial snake repellant; while others use plain mothballs, but when those don’t work, he encouraged people to call animal control, and let the pros take it from there.

“Leave snakes alone; most snakes even the poisonous ones prefer to avoid humans; so a little noise and a little encouragement they’ll go their way,” said McCoy.

There are 55 kinds of snakes that call Mississippi home, but only six of them are poisonous.