Grader flattens unusual visitor

By JOEL WRIGHT

Staff writer

When Greg Ballew saw a piece of pipe on the ground while driving his county road grader home, he was surprised what it actually was.

“As I was getting closer, it started to move, so I swerved back over and ran it over,” Ballew said. “Then I backed up, took the blade and pulled its head off.”

The animal, according to Kansas Herpetological Society President Daniel Murrow, was a red-tailed Boa constrictor, not native to Kansas.

Murrow traveled from his home in Hutchinson to take pictures of the snake. He estimated it to be about seven feet long.

Ballew ran over the boa Friday, northeast of Burns on 30th Road.

“I was just shocked that it was out in the middle of nowhere,” he said. “I had to go roll hay, and when I came back, some kids had gotten it.”

Ballew said he later saw the snake hanging on a fence near where he had hit it.

“People just need to stop dumping their animals, that’s for sure,” he said.