It’s not the usual sort of blockage that might be expected in a bathroom, but when Laura Cowell’s five-year-old son lifted the lid of their toilet he was shocked to discover a baby python was the source of the problem.

The toilet had been blocked for several days and had been draining slowly, Cowell said, and the reason came to light when her son went to use the bathroom last week.

“He was frantic and shaking and I could tell something was wrong, but that was not what I expected,” Cowell said after her son found the 3ft-long (91cm) royal python that emerged from the toilet at their home in Southend, Essex.

“I had to use a broom handle to lift the lid, then out popped its head and its tongue came out as well,” she told the BBC. She said she was “petrified” and put weights on the toilet lid for days afterwards.

Specialists from a local pet shop, Scales and Fangs, were called to remove the snake, which “smelt of bleach and a bit toilety”, the store’s Ethan Pinion told the BBC. The python, which was harmless, “most likely came up the U-bend” and was expected to recover fully, he said.

Rob Yeldham, the owner of the store in Leigh-on-Sea, said: “I’ve done many snake rescues in my 10 years, but I’ve never had one in a toilet before. It’s definitely a first for us.”

Pythons are a family of nonvenomous snakes native to Asia, Africa and Australia. They subdue their prey by squeezing it to death.

England is home to four kinds of wild snake: the barred grass snake (Natrix helvetica), the eastern grass snake (Natrix natrix), the adder (Vipera berus), and the smooth snake (Coronella austriaca).

Yeldham told the BBC neighbours of Cowell had recently moved and old vivariums had been left outside with the rubbish.

“I think the snake probably escaped and went down their toilet, and ended up in this one, as all the sewers are connected,” he said. He added it was unlikely the snake had been there long as it was healthy and not underweight, though it was suffering from scale rot, “probably from the bleach”.

The snake is being treated at the store and will be rehomed once it is healthy again.

