The total length ranges from 2.8 to 5.8 m. Weight up to 61 kg. Sexual dimorphism is observed - females are larger than males. The head is triangular, flattened. Two frontal frontal flaps are larger than the middle pair of frontal flaps following them, these, in turn, are almost equal to the rear pair of flaps. The remaining scutes on the head, with the exception of the unpaired parietal scutellum, are small and irregular in shape. The front muzzle of the muzzle with 2 recesses, the front upper labial flaps on each side have one recess. All three pairs of frontal flaps are almost the same width. The body is strong, slender, covered with 65-70 rows of scales.
The color is different: yellow-brown, gray, olive, orange, light brown. The belly is reddish-white. Most of the top of the head is occupied by a black-brown spot, facing the tip forward. A series of black-brown spots intertwined in the form of a chain stretches along the entire back, oblong-quadrangular, more or less rectangular or oblique, on the sides they often merge. These spots stretch to the end of the tail.
He loves open savannas, places off the coast of ponds, meadows, light forests, rocky hills, semi-deserts. It occurs at an altitude of 2000 m above sea level. He spends almost his entire life on earth, sometimes crawling on trees or shrubs. Swims great. Active at night. During the day hides in the burrows of aardvarks, porcupines or warty pigs.
It feeds on Cape dams, rabbit, hares, reed rats, young pigs, cats, jackals, vervet monkeys, birds, small antelopes, porcupines, fish, monitor lizards, small crocodiles, ducks, carrion. Young pythons feed on small birds, mice, lizards, frogs.
This is an egg-laying snake. The female lays from 17 to 74 eggs.
They live in Botswana, Angola, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Zambia, Burundi, Tanzania, Kenya, Namibia, South Africa, Mozambique, Zimbabwe.
