Three-metre long python drags boy, 5, into swimming pool

A five-year-old boy has survived being bitten and dragged into a swimming pool by a three-metre long python who had wrapped itself around his leg.

Beau Blake was rescued by his 76-year-old grandfather Allan, who jumped into the water after his grandson, pulling him out of the pool with the snake still wrapped around him, Beau's father Ben told a local radio station in Australia.

"[Beau] was just walking around the edge [of the pool]... and I believe the python was sort of sitting there waiting for a victim to come along... and Beau was it," Mr Blake said.

"I saw a big black shadow come out of the bush and before they hit the bottom, it was completely wrapped around his leg."

Mr Blake said Allan had dived in before he even realised what had happened.

Mr Blake said Allan was "father of the year" for jumping in and rescuing Beau with "no self-preservation whatsoever".

“He passed him up to me and then I had to separate the two. I released him (the snake) from his leg,” Beau's father told 3AW Breakfast.

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Mr Blake then separated his son from the snake: "I'm not a little lad... [so] I had him released within 15-20 seconds," Ben said.

He held onto the snake for about 15 minutes while he attempted to reassure his family before releasing the reptile.

"It returned to the scene of the crime, the naughty thing," Mr Blake said.

Beau escaped with minor bite wounds and is being monitored at home. Pythons are not venomous - they grab their prey with their teeth, then wrap and squeeze themselves around its body to kill it - but there is a risk of infection from snakebites.

"He's an absolute trooper," Mr Blake said of his son, admitting it was “somewhat of an ordeal".

Pythons usually eat rodents, birds and lizards, as well as mammals like monkeys, wallabies, pigs - and even the odd cat.

There are 15 species of python in Australia and are among the most common found in people's backyards.

They are protected in Australia and cannot be killed or taken from the wild.