When you’re a junk removal expert, you have to learn to expect the unexpected. After all, you never know who might wander into an old shed or piece of furniture and decide to call it home.
Recently, a junk removal specialist from Pop & Son’s Junk Removal in Alabama was reminded of this when he arrived to remove an old hot tub and realized someone was lurking underneath.
After overturning the hot tub, the junk removal specialist noticed some wood and debris, as well as a small salamander. But the salamander wasn’t the only one who’d been hanging out beneath the tub.
There, almost blending in with the brown cement, was a huge gray rat snake.
“It startled me being that close,” the removal expert told The Dodo.
It makes sense that the snake had decided to linger under the old hot tub. According to the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency, these snakes love living in dark places like wood piles and hollow trees.
Though gray rat snakes are nonvenomous and pose no threat to humans, the removal specialist knew the snake probably shouldn’t stay on the back patio. Grabbing a rake nearby, the man carefully picked up the snake and found a safer home for him in the wilderness on the other side of the yard’s fence.
“I used a garden rake and scooped him up and moved him over to the top of the fence and, from there, directed him to the other side with the tip of the rake,” the removal expert said.
Back in the wild where he belongs, the snake was off to find a new home — hopefully, one that won’t be removed from on top of him anytime soon.