We found rat snakes most often in the rafters of my SIL’s chicken coop & also in the nest boxes, usually with a lump from eating eggs. I made a ‘snake pole’ for handling them: broomstick with a screw eye in the end, some sort of thin rope tied to the screw eye, then run back through to make a loop & long enough to go the length of the broomstick & then some. Get a loop over the snakes head & tighten the rope. I pulled a 5-footer out if a nest box once - so long it coiled around the broomstick & then my arm - my SIL was screaming (literally)!
One does not want rat snakes in the chicken coop, but I bet they would be handy around silos. A rat snake once came thumping down my basement stairs, and then disappeared under something. Never saw any rodents in the house in that time. Now we set traps for mice every fall. Now the city has a lot of rats, and maybe they should distribute rat snakes. The holes in the ground are everywhere. There used to be “fixed” ferrel cats in one area I know well. Never saw any rats there. Now after 2 decades of no breeding, the cats are gone, and the rats are rampant.
Thanks, but, it’s no big deal. I’ve been grabbing snakes by hand ever since I was 7 y/o or so. Only non-poisonous species, of course!
The old jacket and a spare light glove are stationed nearby if I see Mr. (or Ms.) Black Rat Snake again, in a spot where I can nab him (her).
There are definitely less mice around the chicken coops, now. I put out live traps at night, the last few nights, and have not caught a single one!