Being called fat and old is hardly a compliment, but for a massive five-metre-long scrub python found in far north Queensland this week it is a badge of honour.

The python found near Kuranda was estimated to weigh 50 kilograms.

Affectionately named Scrubby, the python is the one of the "fattest you will ever see" general manager of Rainforestation Nature Park Chris Grantham said.

"Because it was quite cool it was quite docile. So they grabbed it and put it in the back of the ute so it didn't get run over," Mr Grantham said.

Scrubby is five metres long and estimated to weigh 50 kilograms. ( Facebook: Rainforestation Nature Park Kuranda )

"We have heaps of scrub pythons up here - they're very common in this part. But nothing that size, that was just incredible.

"You find them two to three metres long ... sometime a bit bigger. But never one that fat.

"They're generally very thin pythons, like a rainforest snake, where as this was really thick, very well fed."

Two wildlife keepers from Rainforestation Nature Park at Kuranda came across the massive python late on Tuesday.

They were driving along Emerald Creek Road when they came across a couple of cars that had stopped.

What the wildlife keepers thought was a tree branch across the road ended up being the five-metre long python.

Photos of the capture went viral with the original photo shared more than 2,400 times in just a matter of days.

According to Australian Reptile Park, the scrub python is Australia's largest snake and is commonly between three to seven metres long but they can grow up to 8.5 metres.

The snakes commonly eat small birds, reptiles and mammals but in some cases the prey it eats is bigger than the snake itself.

Mr Grantham estimated the python to be at least 50 kilograms and perhaps 20 years old.

"To survive that long is pretty amazing ... they generally end up in chicken coops, grabbing the family pet and end up on the end of a shovel."

It took four of the park's wildlife keepers to hold him up for a photo, which went viral after it was posted on the nature park's Facebook page.

Scrubby was just one of two massive scrub pythons to be nabbed this week.

Veteran Cairns snake catcher David Walton received a call this week from a resident about a supersized serpent living in their roof.

"They spotted it hanging off the guttering and eyeballing the cat ... so on the phone they got," he said.

"I've seen literally hundreds of cats and dogs eaten in the 14 years I've been catching snakes.

"It's not like in suburbia where a cat drags a snake or a lizard in, out here the snake drags the cat out."

Mr Walton said scrub pythons are more aggressive than other types of pythons.

"Scrub pythons have been known to be a bitey breed and obviously bigger snakes mean bigger bites," he said.

Scrubby was eventually released in an area west of the park with plenty of rainforest.

"There's hardly any traffic there," Mr Grantham said.