“I was sitting in my recliner on Tuesday morning looking for my glasses and I reached down to a side pocket and there was something cold and slimy in there,” a shocked Joyce Parbery said.

“I jumped up and couldn’t speak.”

Mr Parbery’s husband Herb checked the chair pocket and discovered a black snake curled up inside.

“It took over an hour to get it out, we had to drag the chair outside, put it upside down and cut the chair open so it could escape,” she said.

Mr Parbery successfully released the snake unharmed, but the unexpected visitor has left his wife a little shaken.

“I won’t sit on that chair again,” she said with a smile.

“Now every time I open something I think a snake is going to jump out at me.

“My friends reckon it could’ve been there for months.

“I can’t believe I was sitting there the whole time and had a snake cuddled up to me.”