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NEW YORK – The borough Zoo haw ease be looking for its absent cobra, but a tongue-in-cheek Twitter individual is charting its questionable progress.

Someone using the handle "BronxZoosCobra" has been tweeting to a apace ontogeny sort of mass — more than 78,000 by weekday afternoon. In oppositeness with the individual posing as the 20-inch, highly malevolent snake, the borough Zoo had most 6,000 followers.

"On crowning of the Empire State Building!" BronxZoosCobra posted. "All the people countenance like lowercase mice downbound there. Delicious lowercase mice."

Tweets included digit most "Sex and the City": "I'm totally a SSSamantha."

Another entry riffed on the defy and New Yorkers' fears of the slithering escapee: "It's getting pretty algid out. I conceive it's probably instance to crash. Oh look, an apartment window someone mitt unstoppered meet a crack. Perfect!"

The Reptile House at the borough Zoo, run by the noncommercial Wildlife Conservation Society, closed Friday after installation workers searched but did not find the Egyptian cobra. Zoo officials said weekday they were overconfident the diapsid was hiding in the Reptile House but conceded that uncovering it would be difficult.

"The travail is that the 20-inch, pencil-thin snake, which is months older and weighs inferior than 3 ounces, has wanted discover a bonded hiding blot within the Reptile House," the installation said, describing it as a "complex environment with pumps, motors and other mechanical systems."

The individual behind BronxZoosCobra refused to identify him or herself or say who was typewriting the tweets.

"The iPhone touch screen entireness meet as substantially with a tail," the mortal said in an telecommunicate to The Associated Press signed "Thankssss."

Asked most the Twitter feed's popularity, BronxZoosCobra "knew it would be popular with craniate twitterers and a mild appeal to amphibians. Surprised the mammal response has been so huge."

Kris Stoever, a illustrator and application from Denver, said she institute the cobra tweeting rattling witty.

"It's a absent diapsid on the lam. It's the clog of comedy legend," Stoever said in a telephone interview.

It could take weeks before the cobra feels bonded enough to become discover of hiding, the installation said.

Though the Twitter take is clearly meant to be humorous, a real-life connexion with the diapsid would be no happy matter.

Jeff Corwin, a wildlife proficient for the Animal Planet telegram network, said the diapsid haw be diminutive but "has rattling cyanogenic venom" and "should be respected."

It's implausible that the cobra, habitual to a subtropical climate, would endure rattling daylong in the Northeast algid if it leaves the Reptile House, Corwin said.

Asked how the diapsid was faring in the cold, the individual behind the Twitter statement said: "Hiding in passerbys' scarves has been employed for me so far, but I'm thinking most heading to a sauna to hearty up for a bit."

New Yorkers, habitual to cityfied legends most alligators thriving in the sewers, shouldn't be too worried, Corwin said.

"The truth is, you crapper set on your commode with richness and relaxation," he said. "There module be no baby cobras reaching up for a nibble."

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Associated Press illustrator Ulana Ilnytzky and AP programme scientist Monika Mathur contributed to this report.

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