One Big Reason Why Snakes Love To Slither Up Your Toilet

You expect things to go down a toilet drain, so if something comes up, you've probably got a problem. That's especially true if the thing coming up your drain is a slinking scaly serpent. Stories of snakes slithering up from toilet pipes sound like nightmarish urban legends, but it can really happen. The internet is replete with videos of people pulling snakes out of toilet bowls, always eliciting a stream of horrified comments. Obviously, nobody wants an unexpected intruder in the bathroom, especially a snake, but this also raises the question of why any creature would ever want to be inside our sewer pipes.

Snakes making their way into pipes isn't a fluke accident. Snakes seek out interior spaces on purpose, and the main reason has to do with reptilian anatomy. Animals can either be regulators or conformers, meaning they can either regulate their own body temperature, or rely on the environment to do so. Snakes and other reptiles are conformers, which are often colloquially known as cold-blooded, although it's not really accurate to say their blood is cold. The temperature of their blood depends on their surroundings.

Snakes often seek shelter in buildings because buildings have more consistent temperatures than the wild outdoors where weather fluctuates constantly. On a hot summer day, a snake wants a cool, dark place to take shelter, and on a cold winter night, they want a well-insulated space to stay warm. Unfortunately, your house, and its steel tube plumbing, fit this bill just right.

Snakes may seek out a variety of indoor spaces in their quests to maintain the right body temperature. However, a snake looking for shelter is most likely to choose a basement, attic, or crawlspace. For one of these serpents to actually get into a toilet is rare (fortunately), because it takes a very specific set of circumstances. In many cases, snakes found in toilets didn't even get there by crawling up the pipes, but rather by slithering into the toilet bowl.

For a snake to actually slither into a toilet via the plumbing takes some doing. First, it would have to get into the sewer pipes via a drain or another outlet like a septic tank. A snake could also enter your toilet via another toilet. If your neighbor has a pet snake that gets loose and slips down their toilet, it could swim through the plumbing to your place. Negligent pet owners are one of the main causes of snakes getting loose in residential areas, and they've led to some very serious environmental issues, like Florida's invasion by Burmese pythons.

If you are unfortunate enough to find a snake head poking up from your toilet, or anywhere else in your home for that matter, call your local animal control or wildlife removal center to safely remove the invader. Keep an eye on the snake from a safe distance, but don't try to remove it yourself.