ORRINGTON, Maine — A roughly 4-foot-long ball python that slithered away from his Johnson Mill Road home earlier this week remained missing Friday afternoon, his owner said.
Valerie Nason said her pet snake, Mr. Smithers, went missing shortly after a gathering at her home at 592 Johnson Mill Road on Monday.
Nason said she had brought him outdoors because children who were visiting wanted to have their pictures taken with him and were playing with him and passing him around. She believes her pet python might have left because he was bothered by all the commotion.
Nason, who has owned the snake for more than seven years, said that until Monday, it has never been out overnight. She is worried that if he isn’t found before cold weather sets in, he won’t survive.
However, Nason said she remains hopeful Mr. Smithers will turn up soon and said a possible sighting was reported to her on Thursday.
“I do know that I got a call yesterday. It sounded like a very young man, very early 20s,” she said. “He had called me and said he’d found my snake on Clark Falls Roads on the edge of the road, so he picked him up and put him in the bushes so he wouldn’t get hit by a car and then saw on TV two hours later that he was missing and then went back, of course, and couldn’t find him.”
Nason said she believes Mr. Smithers is still on the same road and within half a mile to a mile of his home.
Anyone who has seen Mr. Smithers is asked to call Nason at 217-1733.