Now that four snakes have been removed from an apparently abandoned home, residents of Brantford’s Eagle Place neighbourhood say they can once again breathe freely.
“They’re out of there, and the smell is gone,” Susan Butler said Wednesday.
It was the strange smell that first tipped Butler and her husband off to something unusual going on at the house next to theirs on Robinson Avenue – and it was their tip to the property’s owner that brought further calls to city police and the SPCA.
As Butler tells it, they were outside on Sunday when they noticed an odd odour coming from next door.
“The smell was really, really bad. It was almost like a raw sewage, but then really when you think about it, it was more like a rotting meat,” Butler said.
“It was all over the neighbourhood. Everybody could smell it.”
Having not noticed anyone around the property for a couple of months, the Butlers called the landlord.
The following morning, Butler saw the landlord remove a number of large totes from the house.
Police showed up soon after. Finding what appeared to be dead snakes inside the totes, they contacted the SPCA.
The SPCA investigator found that two pythons and one rattlesnake had indeed died – but a third python was still hanging on.
“One of them was actually still alive, and obviously in need of some vet care,” said Robin Kuchma, the executive director of the Brant County SPCA.
“Although it appeared to be deceased, he did see a tongue flicker.”
That snake was taken to a local veterinarian, who determined that it was dehydrated and badly underweight, and then transferred to a more specialized rehab centre.
The SPCA continues to investigate the apparent abandonment of the snakes – which, under Brantford’s bylaws, aren’t allowed to be kept in the city as pets.
