Snake fights and swallows a crocodile

Crocodiles have a fearsome reputation but onlookers in Australia's Outback were shocked to witness a 10ft snake, believed to be a python, strangle a crocodile for five hours and then devour it in one piece.

'It was amazing,' Tiffany Corlis told the BBC.

'We saw the snake fighting with the crocodile – it would roll the crocodile around to get a better grip, and coil its body around the crocodile's legs to hold it tight.

'After the crocodile had died, the snake uncoiled itself, came around to the front, and started to eat the crocodile, face-first,' she added.

The snake was 'definitely very full,' when it finished, she said. 'I don't know where it went after that – we all left, thinking we didn't want to stick around!'

The encounter happened at Lake Moondarra, near Mount Isa in Queensland, the Australian state that is home to some of the world's deadliest snakes and crocodiles.

Another witness, Alyce Rosenthal, told local media that the two creatures fought for about five hours. By the end, they appeared exhausted, she said.

"It's not something that you see every day," she said.

Pythons kill their prey by tightening their coils around the animal as it breathes out.

This can cause the animal to suffocate or suffer heart failure, allowing the python to swallow its prey whole. Many snakes have flexible jaws that enable them to swallow prey many times their own body size.