Rats, Snakes & Alligators! Oh My!

I should be writing about Easter, seeing as that was yesterday, but I our Easter weekend started out with waaaay more excitement than dyeing Easter eggs.

When we first moved into our house (2 years ago in 3 days) we had a huge issue with pack rats. They had invaded the built in grill in the backyard and it took Brian months to get rid of them. Fast forward to this winter and Brian found more than 5 pack rats dead in our pool and skimmer. They were back!

While Brian & I were on our mini-vacay, our neighbor came by the house and saw a rat run through our yard and under our house. When we came back I started noticing a God awful smell. It smelled as if we had either left a poopy diaper out or Lucy was pooping in the house. It was nasty. Finally, Brian checked under the window where the neighbor reported the pack rat sighting. Sure enough, the builder had left a small opening under the guest room window. And guess what? The pack rats had made themselves a nice little home in our wall. Super.

Last Thursday night, Brian decided that 9:00pm would be a great time to cut into the wall to find out what was going on. Holy nasty smell Batman!!! I've never smelt such an awful smell in my life.

The first hole.

There was some serious nastiness inside that wall. And with each panel Brian cut, more nastiness. He just kept pulling out pack rat crap. Plus he sucked up at least 2 corpses with the shop vac.

After about 45 minutes he called it a night and decided to come back to it the next morning. 

To make things a bit more interesting, he found another little critter. Well, more like a 6 foot Bull Snake. Yep. a nice snake in the wall chasing those nasty rats. 

Brian is not one to catch a snake so he called the fire department, per our exterminators suggestion. 

They were here in less than 5 minutes and got straight to work chasing this snake around the wall. 

I stayed outside with the kids because a certain little person wanted to catch the snake herself, I think. Sit on the truck she wanted no part of. We couldn't get any closer than this or Reese would flip out!

While we were outside, Brian and the firefighters were inside catching the snake. It was caught fairly quickly, but not without a few heart stopping moments, according to Brian anyway. 

Remember how I said Brian didn't do snakes? Well, when the snake came out he said, and I quote, "I jumped on the bed like a little girl when I thought the snake was getting away." Sure enough. This picture was taken from the top of the guest bed! Wimp!

Look closely. The head is coming out of the cooler.

The tail is to the left of the cooler on the carpet. 

Brian had to let a day pass before he could go back into the room. The thought of more snakes scarred him!

After hours of cleaning out the wall, and finding another corpse and maybe a live one, we are left with this...

Never a dull moment around here, I tell ya. 

Brian is now in the process of disinfecting the room and repairing the wall.

Poor dude. I definitely don't envy being the husband in this situation!