CAPTURING pythons 5.5m and 3.2m long was the easy part, Aaron Chapman reckons.
Mr Chapman and two colleagues removed the two male pythons from the ceiling of the Yorkeys Knob Boating Club near Cairns on Monday.
Now comes the hard part - capturing Mummy, as the locals call her.
Mummy is 6.4m - 21 feet on the old scale - and is thought to be one of the largest pythons in Australia.
Mr Chapman said the Australian Venom Zoo at Kuranda would send four men to attempt to capture Mummy after the 5.5m male snake lifted his colleague clean off the ground.
"We grabbed one and it swung around and lifted Isaac, my larger colleague, off the ground," he said.
The men had to crawl through a one-metre space between roof and ceiling to locate the snakes.
Mr Chapman said the non-venomous Mummy was capable of crushing and swallowing an adult.
The Yorkeys Knob Boating Club has been abandoned for about 15 years, Mr Chapman said, and is now to be renovated, meaning the pythons have to go.
The pythons were reported to have taken up residence in the abandoned building about five years ago, living off animals in adjacent mangroves.
He said boating club members would telephone when Mummy was seen again, at which time they would attempt its capture.
Mr Chapman said the pythons would be released together in rainforest near Kuranda.
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