Heartbroken Queens man offers reward for missing pythons (don’t worry, they’re babies)
Snake charmer wanted.
A Queens man has been desperately searching for his beloved pet pythons after he says a neighbor removed them from a yard without checking to see if they belonged to anyone.
Tai Diaz, 20, had four ball pythons — Helios, Hermes, Zeus and Chloe — but after three of them went missing, he is left with just Helios.
Diaz, who lives in Astoria, says his serpents are sweet-natured, observing, “They never even hissed at me.”
Half of his pantheon — Zeus and Chloe, which he got when they were 4 weeks old — are still just babies. Helios and Hermes he acquired when they were 4 months old.
Diaz says due to his busy work schedule selling motorcycles, snakes are the perfect pets for him. But his lack of free time also delayed his discovery that they were missing.
When he went to give his pets their weekly meal of mice last weekend, he saw two of them were gone, their heat lamps illuminating an empty tank and an empty cage. A few days later, Chloe went missing, Diaz said.
“It’s not the first time they’ve ever gotten out of their cage,” Diaz told the Daily News on Monday. “They never have left the room, though. I’d usually find them in a shoe or behind a piece of furniture in my room.”
Over the weekend, he got word that the reptiles had been spotted, but not rescued, by a neighbor.
A roommate then told Diaz another neighbor had seen snakes in his backyard and put them outside. They haven’t been seen since.
“After he had told me that, I didn’t want to be in the house anymore,” said Diaz, who went to Brooklyn to stay with family for the rest of the weekend.
Diaz is cautiously optimistic that his pets will be rescued. He posted online messages seeking tips and offering a $200 reward for their return.
“In 30 degree weather for too long, even the healthiest snakes — that can be a death sentence,” said Diaz. “I’m hoping someone picked them up and they’re still OK.
“It’s sad, today I’ll be coming home to only feed Helios after all this … I’m just really hoping for the best.”
