When two JMU seniors decided to show off their pet snake Montey, some were surprised at how they decided to do it or why having a 12-foot snake is a good idea.
“I figured it would just be a chill pet to have,” Mike French said. “Three years and 60 pounds later, here he is.”
26-year-old French lives with Frank Sowa, 25, and has raised the snake for three years since he bought it as a baby.
“He’s really good with people, he likes being held,” French said. “Low cost, low maintenance. It’s a good pet.”
French explained that the snake eats only every five to six weeks and eats chicken wings for protein. He also gets calcium because he swallows the bones.
Sowa was not expecting French to bring home such a unique pet, but he was excited about having something different.
“I was ready. I thought it was a great idea but I didn’t realize we had to breed mice in our apartment,” Sowa said. “By the end of that year, he had wiped out our mouse population. He was eating 13 mice at a time once a week a year ago.”
French casually added that the snake has “graduated to drumsticks” and that they would never go back to mice because they are just an “appetizer to him.”
As far as how the picture with the James Madison statue was taken, the guys decided to try something that no one has really seen before with a pet that most people had never seen before.
“When we came up, there was a girl and her parents sitting there and she was telling them how people do crazy things at the statue,” French said.
So the guys decided to add one more thing to the list. They wrapped the python around the statue and captured one of the most unique pictures with the James Madison statue.
–from staff reports
