It's not every day that one gets to see a python wrapping itself around a deer and swallowing the animal in an hour. The tourists in a Sri Lankan national park were surprised to be witness to such an incident.
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The video of a huge python swallowing a deer at Bundala National Park in Hambantota was captured by the tourists and posted online. The incident took place on January 29. The python was 14-foot-long and curled itself around the deer before it squeezed and crushed it and swallowed it.
The forest officials were left awestruck as they couldn't believe what they saw. They say the giant can, after its heavy meal, roam around without food for months.
That the python didn't throw up despite the scores of witnesses came as a surprise to Bundala forest officer, P.A. Muthukumara.
"The pythons normally throw up when it senses people witnessing it devouring an animal. But looks like it was very hungry and despite the disturbance, it swallowed the whole animal," he said.
The officer thinks that the python will not eat for months as it has eaten more than required.
A similar incident took place on a South African farm last year where a four-meter-long python tried swallowing a whole buck. The python tried swallowing the whole animal but regurgitated most of it after struggling with the task for some time.
In 2017 an Indonesian man was swallowed by a python on the island of Sulawesi. Villagers found the body of 25-year-old Akbar Salubiro inside a 23-foot long python. People went looking for him after he failed to return home from harvesting palm oil. Villagers found the python lying still and upon cutting it they found Salubiro's body swallowed whole.
