After posting a reply to a comment over on K's blog, I thought I had better recount the adventure here.

We are taking care of my eldest's ball python while he is gone air-forcing (is that a verb? ;). We got quite a surprise recently when we got back from a visit to California (I was still there in training) and found that the neighbor girl that had been taking care of the animals (but not the snake) left the cage open. She must've been trying to get a better look at it and forgot to close it. Needless to say it had escaped by the time we returned! We looked absolutely everywhere and it wasn't until almost two weeks later when the dog started trying to rip apart the kitchen cabinetry that we discovered that it had somehow got into our ventilation. I had been telling everyone that the dog (we have a JRT that is a rodent hunter so I figured it would naturally also be a rodent hunter-hunter!) would find it and take care of it. When I first heard that the dog had found the snake (I was out of town) I was disappointed that the dog hadn't shredded it. I thought the dog was afraid of the snake. It turned out that since the snake was still inside the vent the dog was biting, scratching and ripping into the cabinet trying to get at the snake! Of course I wouldn't want the dog to go after a wild snake and keep her under control when we are outdoors, but this restored my faith in her hunter instincts. Way to go Annie!

After removing the vent they were able to coax the thing out with a dead mouse, retrieve it, and return it safely to its cage.