How to prevent snakes from climbing brick walls? (1 Viewer)

So I usually leave snakes alone. I find them all the time in the garden, such as flathead snakes and/or earth snakes. But I had a bit of an incident last year. There is always a barn swallow nest on my front porch. Near it the brick comes to a right angle, and in the vertex of the angle is a 1/4 inch irrigation line. I suspect this is where the snake climbed up although I'm not sure. One night I came out to a 3 1/2-4 feet long ratsnake IN the nest and is in the process of eating one of the barnswallows. I had to eliminate this transgressor.

I didn't think the barnswallows would come back; it took them a long time. I thought they could maybe smell the snake from before and was contemplating knocking the nest down and hosing everything off. However, a new resident has recently shown up. So I'm wondering if there is any sort of apparatus I could install so as to prevent any snake from climbing up the wall again.

Hello and welcome to the forum on behalf of the staff and moderators. You might try and put some very small hole (1/4 inch) wire fence type material at the bottom and top of the pipe. That might help?