Florida woman shocked to find python in laundry

COCOA, Fla. (WOFL FOX 35) - A Florida woman got the shock of her life when she spotted a ball python while doing the laundry.  Juanita Tedesco, of Cocoa, said the snake even tried to eat her pet rat, "Princess."

"I was rinsing out the rat blankets and a blanket fell down, and he was there all wrapped around the blanket," explained Tedesco, "and he tried to eat it [the blanket], and it was really gross."

Tedesco thinks the python could smell her pet rat right on that blanket. The python was turned over to Brevard County Animal Control. Police believe the snake is somebody's pet that slithered away.

It's the third snake encounter reported in Florida in a week. 

On Tuesday, a South Orlando man discovered a python coiled on the floor of his kitchen pantry.  Lenny Lichtman panicked and called 911.  Orange County Fire-Rescue members arrived and nabbed the snake, which they delivered to Gatorland.  Lichtman suspects that the snake was also someone's pet and had gotten inside his house through a door to his garage.

Days earlier,  an 8-foot python slithered into the garage of a a Pembroke Pines home, startling an unsuspecting homeowner who was taking his dog for a walk.  Joseph Liscinsky told the Sun Sentinel that he quickly put his 14-pound dog back inside his house after spotting the snake Friday morning.  He says the python bit his fingers as he wrestled with it before wildlife officials arrived.