MIAMI -- An X-ray of a bulge in a python snake shows that it ate a cat, according to a veterinarian.

Elidia Rodriguez, of Miami Gardens, had been looking for her year-old Siamese cat for two days when her son found a bulging Burmese python slithering in her back yard. Al Cruz from the Miami-Dade Fire Rescue anti-venom unit then captured the snake, and it was taken to the Sense of Wonder Nature Center at A.D. Barnes National Park.

Veterinarian William Chavez said an X-ray shows evidence that the bulge in the python was indeed from a cat it had eaten.

"We usually get two birds here a week that get attacked by cats. They either get killed, mauled. Baby opossums. Cats kill everything ...(In this case), something killed a cat and swallowed it," Chavez said.

Ron Magill, of Miami Metrozoo, said many non-native animals, such as pythons and iguanas, now live in South Florida.

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"Large monitor, African monitor lizards, all kinds of chameleons ... Everybody knows about the parrots. They see them all over the place. Just the fish -- the invasive fish we have in our canal system that people see every day in their aquariums and let them go. They're doing damage to our environment," Magill said.

Magill said that many of the pythons, which can grow up to 22 feet, were pets that grew too big and were released into the wild.

"In my 26 years at the zoo, I've received well over 100 phone calls from people who want to get rid of their snakes that they've had as pets and they've grown out of their pet-hood, so to speak," Magill said.

The released snakes can also find each other and reproduce in the wild, experts said.