Nature
PUBLISHED
The common death adder (Acanthophis antarcticus) already has quite a fearsome reputation as one of the most venomous land snakes found in Australia. And what is more dangerous than a death adder with two fangs ready to strike? Well, a death adder with three of course!
Keepers at the Australian Reptile Park made the unusual discovery and reported that the snake has a fully functional third fang on the left side of its mouth. This also means that the snake is producing a large venom yield, which is contributing to the antivenom program.
“Snakes naturally shed their fangs regularly but rarely do they stick around, and even more rarely do they actually produce venom like this one does,” Operations Manager Billy Collett told IFLScience. “We don’t know what has caused this and we don’t have the facilities here to do proper testing, but our best guess is a rare mutation.”
Death adders are known to have one of the fastest strikes of any snake in the world and can attack their prey of frogs, lizards, and birds in a mind-boggling 0.15 seconds. For any humans unlucky enough to be bitten, the venom can cause paralysis, respiratory issues and, in extreme cases, death. With a third fully functioning fang, the team think this could be the most dangerous death adder ever recorded.
“This is something we’ve never seen before,” said Collett in a statement sent to IFLScience. “We’ve had this death adder in the venom program for about seven years, but only recently did we notice the third fang. I thought it would just shed off over time, but one year later, and it’s still there!”
The antivenom program at the Australian Reptile Park sees the team “milking” five of the most dangerous snakes in Australia, including death adders, taipans, brown snakes, tiger snakes, and black snakes, all for the process of making antivenom.
