Get Snakes to Slither Out of Your Yard With These 10 Tips

You're relaxing in your yard, enjoying a friendly barbecue or watching the kids play, when suddenly something slithers past your feet. While you might have been contemplating fun plans for your next garden get-together just moments ago, your biggest question now is likely how to get rid of snakes in your yard.

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What Are Some Ways to Get Snakes to Leave Your Lawn?

To get rid of snakes, you need to remove the things that attract them and keep them coming back. In most cases, snakes don't want to hang out with you any more than you want to spend time with them. Making your yard unattractive to the reptiles is the easiest way to prevent snake infestations. If a snake can't find what it needs in your yard, it'll probably leave on its own.

How to Get Rid of Snakes in Your Yard: A Step-By-Step Guide

Making your yard an unfriendly environment for snakes isn't especially difficult. Like all creatures, snakes are looking for shelter, food and water. If your yard doesn't offer these things, snakes typically won't stick around. To take to make your lawn and garden unappealing to these visitors:

1. Encourage a snake to move on by spraying water at it from a safe distance. You can also burn wood in a fire pit to create smoke, since snakes often leave an area when smoke is present.

2. Remove food sources. Snakes typically eat bugs, rodents, birds, frogs and fish. Reducing the populations of any prey on your property can help discourage snakes from visiting. Remove any pet food, fallen fruit or birdseed that might be attracting a snake's natural prey.

3. Eliminate water sources. Snakes drink from ponds, bird baths and garden fountains, so if you have a snake problem, you may want to temporarily remove any water features from your yard.

4. Get rid of things that could serve as shelter for snakes. Start by filling any holes in your yard with dirt or gravel to prevent snakes from burrowing. Secure sheds or outbuildings that could provide shelter. Remove firewood piles and dense brush to keep snakes from hiding in these areas. Removing snake habitats ensures they won't have a place to stay if they happen to get into your yard.

5. Cut your grass. If you keep your grass trimmed to below 1 inch in height, snakes have fewer places to hide while moving through your yard.

6. Design your garden with preventing snake infestations in mind. Consider adding snake-repellent plants such as marigold, lemongrass, onion, garlic and wormwood to your garden to keep snakes away. Add decorative lava rocks to deter snakes from slithering over a specific area of your yard.

7. Consider natural repellents. Cinnamon oil, cloves, vinegar, cedar wood chips and powdered sulfur all help repel snakes. You can put natural repellents around the perimeter of your yard or in specific areas where you've seen snakes before.

8. Purchase a commercial snake repellent. Many commercial repellents are toxic to humans and other animals that might come onto your property, but commercially available fox urine is a powerful snake repellent that doesn't cause harm to pets or wildlife.

9. Install snake-proof fencing. This type of barrier is typically made of quarter-inch hardware cloth fencing. It should be at least 3 feet high and buried at least 3 to 4 inches deep to prevent snakes from burrowing underneath. You can also angle the fence about 30 degrees to keep snakes from climbing it.

10. Trap the snake. If a snake doesn't want to leave on its own, you may have to trap it. Only try trapping it yourself if you're certain the snake is nonvenomous and you have a safe place to relocate it once it's trapped. If you plan to trap and relocate a snake, you should check local regulations before doing so. Some areas have laws prohibiting animal relocation.

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When to Call a Professional for Snake Removal

Knowing how to get rid of snakes in your yard is useful if you're faced with common, harmless reptiles, but dealing with venomous snakes requires professional assistance. A pest control company that works with snakes can safely remove any slithery local residents that resist leaving.