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I do try to spread out fun pet stories when they are similar, but I was just so shocked by the details in this particular one I had to share it sooner rather than later. Back when I wrote about domestic cat Karim traveling across countries to make his way to his owners’ new home, I mentioned how I was surprised a cat traveled so far.
Today’s particular pet isn’t impressive for how far it traveled to return home, but for its species: a snake. In this case, a pet corn snake. Edinburgh-based newspaper The Scotsman published a report at the end of last month about its city native Kevin Scott and his homeward bound snake Salsa.
Scott has three pet snakes, Salsa, Nacho, and Snow. Towards the beginning of the summer Salsa escaped and Scott didn’t hold out much hope for seeing her again. Snakes aren’t exactly known for making dramatic returns back home if they get away. In addition, Salsa is on the smaller end of corn snakes (which do get about the size of garter snakes, but Salsa is pencil-thin and can curl up in a palm), so the chances of her being found, in addition to surviving in a city, were rather slim.
Then at the end of the summer the very newspaper that published Scott’s story ran an article about three domesticated corn snakes found slithering around various streets in the city. The snakes were taken to the Scottish SPCA for re-homing.
After reading the report Scott went to the SPCA center with pictures of Salsa in hopes that she was one of the discovered snakes. Not only did Scott find Salsa at the center, but he learned that she’d been discovered on Commercial Street in the Edinburgh district of Leith, the road on which he lives. She’d been trying to cross the street, so one might say she’d been attempting to get back home.
Of course, saying Salsa was making an epic trip back home might be exaggerating a bit. I don’t know which side of the street Salsa attempted to cross, so maybe she was headed in the opposite direction from Scott’s apartment. Also, given her small size it’s more likely she never traveled far. Still, the lack of details about Salsa’s adventure make it fun to speculate about her touring all over Edinburgh before making her way back home.
I’m not a fan of snakes at all; they don’t hold any appeal for me as pets. But I am very happy that Scott was able to find Salsa again, especially given the unlikelihood of him doing so. Hearing about their story makes me wonder if maybe snakes do have more personality than I’d ever before ascribed to them.
I also hope that the two other found snakes, still homeless at the SPCA as of the story’s September 20 publishing date, have found or soon will find homes. I may not like snakes as pets, but that doesn’t stop me from wanting homeless pets to find homes, or from smiling at the story of a pet and its owner’s happy reunion.
Related Articles:
Feeding Pre-Killed Prey To Your Snake
A Really Odd Couple: Dog and Capybara
(*This image by Factumquintus is listed as in the Public Domain and is therefore free for distribution and use.)
