A US man is in custody after he bit a pet python in what California police said was an apparently unprovoked attack.

The suspect, David Senk, 54, was arrested on suspicion of unlawfully maiming or mutilating a reptile, Sacramento police said. The badly injured snake underwent surgery.

Senk said he had no recollection of the incident after blacking out from drinking but felt "horrible as hell about it."

Asked why he might have bitten the snake, Senk replied: "I get drunk, I get crazy. I don't know. I've been an alcoholic for a long time."

Senk was taken into custody after police, responding to a report of an assault, found him lying on the ground with blood on his face.

Officers were then approached by another man and a woman who told them Senk had just taken two large bites out of their python when they let him hold the snake.

"There was nothing to indicate that the snake provoked him at all. He (Senk) just out of the blue took a bite," the police spokesman said. "From what I understand, he didn't say anything. He was pretty incoherent."

The snake, measuring 3 to 4 feet in length, is recovering after a vet stitched it up.

Senk said he was "not too fond of snakes (but) I try not to bite them."

"It's the other way around usually," he added. They bite me." -03 Sep 2011