1:05p.m. 27th March 2008

| By Mark Furler

Photo Gallery: Python eats wallaby

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Amazing photos of a scrub python eating a wallaby in outback Queensland have gone around the world - but Australia Zoo points out the snakes' Asian counterparts have been known to eat people.

While in Australia, a kangaroo or wallaby would be the biggest lunch item on the menu, other bizarre culinary delights have included alligators.

In Florida, a one metre gator tangled with a three metre python three years ago with the results being less than pretty.

The snake apparently tried to swallow the gator whole — and then exploded.

The latest pictures of a scrub python eating a wallaby near German Creek Mine, 240km south-west of Mackay, have had web watchers blogging OMG from the US to Japan.

An Australia Zoo spokesperson told thedaily.com.au that it was pretty rare for a python to eat a big kangaroo or wallaby.

"But the scrub python in northern Queensland regularly eats wallabies. They’re Australia’s largest python so they’re able to ambush wallabies,'' a spokesman said.

The biggest snake at Australia Zoo is Lilly, a reticulated python who is over seven metres long (23 ft) and estimated to weigh about 150kg.

The big girl downs a rabbit or small goat every three to four weeks in the summer months at the zoo.

"If they eat something like a wallaby, it could take anywhere from half an hour to a couple of hours to swallow,'' the Zoo official said.

"Depending on the size of the food item, it could take a few weeks to digest. That could last them for a month.

Pythons have been attracting more than their share of headlines in recent months with one that ate four golf balls in northern New South Wales in December having them removed ina world-first operation.

In January, a python that bit a woman and wrapped itself around her leg had to be killed and its head prised off the bite on Moreton Island.

The woman was airlifted to a hospital north of Brisbane after the bite from the 1.8 metre-long snake.

In March, a carpet python dubbed "Blaze" was recovering from third degree burns at the Gold Coast's Currumbin Wildlife Hospital after joyriding under the hood of a car.

The hospital's senior veterinarian Michael Pyne said the 2.5m-long reptile was discovered wrapped around the car's radiator.

In February, a Sunshine Coast man captured on film a python divulging two possums.

In 2006, a 3.5 metre (12-foot) pet Burmese python in Idaho swallowed a queen-size electric blanket with the snake's sensors indicating warm prey - or perhaps the blanket got tangled up with the snake's rabbit dinner.

All in all, the message is clear - don't mess with a hungry python!