Snake Removal in Buford, GA

Snakes around Buford homes and apartments

Snakes in a city known for a giant mall surprise people, but Buford's layout suits them. The development around the retail hub left retention ponds, drainage swales, planted islands and wooded buffers between parking lots and apartment buildings, and those strips hold mice and rats fed by the commercial trash. Snakes follow the food. Toward Lake Lanier and Buford Dam the land gets more wooded, and around the older downtown, stacked wood, sheds and crawlspaces give them cover too.

The good news: our crew says roughly nine in ten snake calls are harmless rat snakes, and only about one call in a hundred turns out to be venomous. Georgia has 47 native snakes, and only seven are venomous; the copperhead is the one realistically found around Buford homes. And every non-venomous snake is protected by state law — killing one is illegal. A snake out in the yard is usually gone within a few minutes to an hour if you leave it alone. One inside is worth a call right away.

Why snakes show up here

Snakes need two things: food and cover. Around Buford, the food is mostly rodents drawn to restaurant and store dumpsters and to the dense new housing next to them. The cover is the tall grass at pond edges, the mulch and shrubs in landscaped strips, the brush in leftover wooded buffers, and the clutter in garages and around older homes. Remove a snake and leave both in place, and another one moves in. That's why a snake call so often turns into a rodent plan.

Most are helpful, and protected

The snake you're most likely to meet around a Buford home is a rat snake — a long, often dark climber that eats exactly the rodents you don't want. Kingsnakes even eat other snakes, copperheads included. Garter and brown snakes are small and eat slugs and worms. All of these are protected in Georgia, and killing them is illegal. Most people assume a snake is venomous; it almost never is, so let a pro identify it before anyone reacts.

Copperheads in Buford

The copperhead is the venomous snake that does well in suburban areas, and it's the one to watch for here. Copperheads blend into leaf litter, pine straw and mulch, and they're most active at dawn and dusk in warm months. Most bites happen when someone steps or reaches near one they didn't see. Wear gloves while gardening, look before reaching under shrubs or woodpiles, and if you see one, keep back and call — don't try to kill it.

Don't reach for the shovel

Georgia law protects all 40 non-venomous native species, so killing one is a violation. It's also dangerous: going after a snake is how a lot of bites happen, since a snake can strike farther than most people think, and even a dying snake can bite by reflex. If the snake is outside and moving, the simplest move is usually to let it go — it will typically leave on its own within an hour. If it's in the house, garage or crawlspace, call for removal.

What the pro does

First, the pro identifies the snake and removes it safely, relocating non-venomous ones as the law allows. Then they look at why it came: rodent signs, overgrowth against the foundation, stacked wood or debris, and gaps under garage doors or into the crawlspace. The advice that follows — deal with the rodents, cut back the overgrowth, seal the gaps — is what makes the next snake less likely. Snake repellents and mothballs don't work and shouldn't be used.

Snakes in garages and crawlspaces

Snakes get into garages and crawlspaces looking for shade and the mice already living there. Older Buford homes near downtown often sit on crawlspaces with aging vent screens; newer homes and townhomes may have gaps at the garage door seal. The pro removes the snake, then seals vent screens and door gaps with metal and handles the rodents, because a rodent-free space is the one snakes stop visiting.