Last night, I encountered the most dangerous, most venomous snake in the jungle – Fer De Lance (Bothrops asper) on a path. Generally, local clinics have antivenom and with it, the mortality rate drops to zero, but it’s better not to test it – the venom causes rapid necrosis and disrupts blood clotting. It also has a built-in night vision camera in its head. The system is so sensitive that the snake can detect a temperature difference of just 0.003 °C. This helps it hunt warm-blooded rodents and birds at night, when visual sight is limited.
It’s also super fast. Four and a half meters per second. That’s faster than you can blink. Indeed, if you’re not sitting right in front of its nose, there’s enough time for it to switch to a combat position, allowing you to jump away – so I managed to get by from behind.
Hi, I'm Rauf Aliev. 