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Wow, 50,000 snake deaths per year! Living in Europe, I've never seen snakes except in a zoo. How do you avoid them in a country with snakes? Can they pop up a

Wow, 50,000 snake deaths per year! Living in Europe, I've never seen snakes except in a zoo. How do you avoid them in a country with snakes? Can they pop up anywhere out of nowhere?

Nux 13y ago
You should go in the country side more, there's loads of snakes in Europe in the wild, though not Boas or Pythons.
- masklinn 13y ago
  Even in the countryside, it's rare to see snakes unless you're actively looking for them. And the few somewhat dangerous ones (mostly the common adder) is fairly small and shy, not aggressive, and very rarely dangerous.
Synaesthesia 13y ago
Really the biggest risk is if you're walking in the veld and step on one accidentally, they are not aggressive animals that seek confrontation with humans. Unfortunately they hide themselves very well and are entirely motionless when resting so it's easy to accidentally step on. A snakebite is not usually deadly. Most deaths occur in poor parts of Africa where people do not get appropriate treatment.
atmosx 13y ago
In Greece we have plenty, in the countryside and in the Islands. If you go to Ithaca for example, you'll come across many snakes in June-August if you visit the villages on the hills. You avoid them by learning to live with them. Most snakes are afraid of human. Some are not poisonous. People who live in the specific knows what's dangerous and what's not, where they live what to do and how to react.
oska 13y ago
It's mostly that the snakes avoid you. Snakes don't see humans as food and so mostly get out of the way when humans approach. In Australia, where I live, it's said that even in the suburbs there will be a snake living somewhere close by. But most people will rarely ever see a snake and most snake bites are from people being foolish, like trying to kill a cornered snake. Only four to six Australians suffer a fatal snake bite each year, and this is with our famous collection of highly venomous snakes [1]. I understand that fatal snake bites are much more common in India though, and I guess that's from population pressure and many more Indians living a rural life. [1] http://www.australiangeographic.com.au/topics/science-environment/2012/07/australias-10-most-dangerous-snakes http://www.australiangeographic.com.au/topics/science-enviro...
- anotherevan 13y ago
  The way I had it explained to me by a first aide instructor, although gram for gram of venom, Australian snakes are some of the worst, the delivery system is not as efficient. Venomous Australian snakes generally have a groove down the outside of the tooth which the venom runs down. So when bitten a lot of venom will get soaked into the clothing, and it generally goes into the lymph node system more than into the bloodstream. Whereas Indian snakes have a hollow tooth like a hypodermic needle which delivers the venom efficiently into the bloodstream.
- benatkin 13y ago
  Here's the Wikipedia page on it. The second table has the deaths. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epidemiology_of_snakebites http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epidemiology_of_snakebites Most are close to the equator. The data confirms Aardwolf's experience.
davidiach 13y ago
I live in Europe too and I've seen a lot of snakes in the wilderness in my lifetime. Some of them even poisonous.
- leephillips 13y ago
  Super Pedant to the Rescue: most of them are probably good eatin' However, some of them are venomous.
Tyrannosaurs 13y ago
We have adders in the UK which are poisonous, though rarely deadly (the greatest risk being to children and the elderly). They're very shy and personally I've never seen one (they are present where I live) but their first instinct is to run away if they have a chance. Nice incident of a tourist near where I live picking one up to have a photo taken with it and being bitten in the face and rushed to hospital. He survived which saved the doctor having to put "stupidity" down under cause of death.
eloff 13y ago
Here in Panama snakes bite about 2500 people per year (out of 3 million), mostly in the dry season. Here it is common practice to burn the rain forest around settlements to combat snakes. Only about 25 people die, but more have amputations because the most common snakes here are pit vipers with tissue destroying venom. Snakes here are typically not aggressive, the largest danger is stepping too close to one. I've had several near misses with snakes while out running trails in the rain forest (about one snake per month, though usually not venemous.) I've also had a big pit viper attack my car when I drove about a meter from it. You should have seen the face of the guy who washed it when I told him that the streaks were fer-de-lance venom!
tjr 13y ago
There's an area not far from where I live (midwestern U.S.) where I've seen numerous snakes. You can just be walking out in a grassy area, and snakes dart left and right trying to not get stepped on. Totally harmless, unless maybe you tried to annoy them. But I'm guessing you'd be most interested in avoiding more harmful snakes, like, how to avoid being killed by a python or some-such. I too have only seen pythons in zoos.

Wow, 50,000 snake deaths per year! Living in Europe, I've never seen snakes except in a zoo. How do you avoid them in a country with snakes? Can they pop up anywhere out of nowhere?

Nux 13y ago

You should go in the country side more, there's loads of snakes in Europe in the wild, though not Boas or Pythons.

masklinn 13y ago
Even in the countryside, it's rare to see snakes unless you're actively looking for them. And the few somewhat dangerous ones (mostly the common adder) is fairly small and shy, not aggressive, and very rarely dangerous.

Synaesthesia 13y ago

Really the biggest risk is if you're walking in the veld and step on one accidentally, they are not aggressive animals that seek confrontation with humans. Unfortunately they hide themselves very well and are entirely motionless when resting so it's easy to accidentally step on. A snakebite is not usually deadly. Most deaths occur in poor parts of Africa where people do not get appropriate treatment.

atmosx 13y ago

In Greece we have plenty, in the countryside and in the Islands. If you go to Ithaca for example, you'll come across many snakes in June-August if you visit the villages on the hills. You avoid them by learning to live with them. Most snakes are afraid of human. Some are not poisonous. People who live in the specific knows what's dangerous and what's not, where they live what to do and how to react.

oska 13y ago

It's mostly that the snakes avoid you. Snakes don't see humans as food and so mostly get out of the way when humans approach. In Australia, where I live, it's said that even in the suburbs there will be a snake living somewhere close by. But most people will rarely ever see a snake and most snake bites are from people being foolish, like trying to kill a cornered snake. Only four to six Australians suffer a fatal snake bite each year, and this is with our famous collection of highly venomous snakes [1]. I understand that fatal snake bites are much more common in India though, and I guess that's from population pressure and many more Indians living a rural life. [1] http://www.australiangeographic.com.au/topics/science-environment/2012/07/australias-10-most-dangerous-snakes http://www.australiangeographic.com.au/topics/science-enviro...

anotherevan 13y ago
The way I had it explained to me by a first aide instructor, although gram for gram of venom, Australian snakes are some of the worst, the delivery system is not as efficient. Venomous Australian snakes generally have a groove down the outside of the tooth which the venom runs down. So when bitten a lot of venom will get soaked into the clothing, and it generally goes into the lymph node system more than into the bloodstream. Whereas Indian snakes have a hollow tooth like a hypodermic needle which delivers the venom efficiently into the bloodstream.
benatkin 13y ago
Here's the Wikipedia page on it. The second table has the deaths. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epidemiology_of_snakebites http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epidemiology_of_snakebites Most are close to the equator. The data confirms Aardwolf's experience.

davidiach 13y ago

I live in Europe too and I've seen a lot of snakes in the wilderness in my lifetime. Some of them even poisonous.

leephillips 13y ago
Super Pedant to the Rescue: most of them are probably good eatin' However, some of them are venomous.

Tyrannosaurs 13y ago

We have adders in the UK which are poisonous, though rarely deadly (the greatest risk being to children and the elderly). They're very shy and personally I've never seen one (they are present where I live) but their first instinct is to run away if they have a chance. Nice incident of a tourist near where I live picking one up to have a photo taken with it and being bitten in the face and rushed to hospital. He survived which saved the doctor having to put "stupidity" down under cause of death.

eloff 13y ago

Here in Panama snakes bite about 2500 people per year (out of 3 million), mostly in the dry season. Here it is common practice to burn the rain forest around settlements to combat snakes. Only about 25 people die, but more have amputations because the most common snakes here are pit vipers with tissue destroying venom. Snakes here are typically not aggressive, the largest danger is stepping too close to one. I've had several near misses with snakes while out running trails in the rain forest (about one snake per month, though usually not venemous.) I've also had a big pit viper attack my car when I drove about a meter from it. You should have seen the face of the guy who washed it when I told him that the streaks were fer-de-lance venom!

tjr 13y ago

There's an area not far from where I live (midwestern U.S.) where I've seen numerous snakes. You can just be walking out in a grassy area, and snakes dart left and right trying to not get stepped on. Totally harmless, unless maybe you tried to annoy them. But I'm guessing you'd be most interested in avoiding more harmful snakes, like, how to avoid being killed by a python or some-such. I too have only seen pythons in zoos.