Snake Removal in Mableton, GA

Snakes around your Mableton home

Hilly, wooded Mableton gives snakes plenty to work with. Leaf litter builds up on lot backs that nobody rakes, stacked-stone and block retaining walls on sloped yards hold heat and have gaps to hide in, and mid-century crawlspaces with broken vent screens house mice. Put those together and snakes turn up around foundations, in carports and on basement steps. Most of them are rat snakes hunting rodents.

The first thing to know: most snake calls involve harmless snakes. Georgia has 47 native snake species, and only 7 are venomous. The one a Mableton homeowner is realistically likely to see is the copperhead. The second: all non-venomous snakes are protected in Georgia, and killing one is illegal. And a snake out in the yard is usually gone within a few minutes to an hour, so often the best move is to leave it alone.

Outside vs. inside

If the snake is in the yard, on the driveway or in a flower bed, give it room. It's usually passing through and will be gone well within the hour, often before anyone could get there. If it's inside — basement, garage, laundry room, crawlspace door — call right away. A snake indoors finds a gap or a box to hide in, and the longer you wait, the harder it is to locate.

Why sloped wooded lots draw snakes

Snakes look for two things: cover and food. In Mableton the cover is the leaf-filled ravine behind the house, ivy on a bank, a retaining wall, or a woodpile against the basement wall. The food is the mice and rats living in older crawlspaces and garages. A snake that finds both near your foundation will keep coming back until one of them goes away.

Copperheads in south Cobb

The copperhead is the venomous snake that actually lives in suburban Georgia, and wooded south-Cobb lots suit it. It blends into dead leaves and is most active on warm evenings, so people usually meet one while reaching into a bed or stepping off a path at dusk. If you see one, back away, keep pets and kids clear, and call. Don't try to catch it or kill it. That's how most bites happen.

Most snakes are protected

Georgia protects every non-venomous native snake, and harming one is against the law. The usual Mableton visitors are rat snakes, which climb and hunt rodents, plus kingsnakes, which eat other snakes, including copperheads, and small garter and brown snakes. All of them are useful to have around, and none of them are worth a shovel. Snakes are also the animal people misidentify most often. Only a very small share of calls turn out to involve a venomous snake.

What the pro does

The pro identifies the snake from a safe distance, removes it with proper tools, and relocates non-venomous snakes without hurting them. Then they look at why it came: rodent sign in the crawlspace, a vent missing its screen, a gap under the garage door, heavy cover against the foundation. Fixing those is what keeps the next snake from coming in.

Crawlspaces and basements

Mid-century homes on sloped Mableton lots often have a crawlspace on one end and a walk-out basement on the other. Both are cool, dark and full of the mice that snakes hunt. Once the snake is out, the openings get closed: metal screens on the foundation vents, sweeps on basement and garage doors, sealed gaps around pipes. Getting rid of the rodents removes the main reason a snake would go in.