A tropical island may seem like an ideal place for holiday but has been taken over by incestuous serpents.
Ilha de Queimada Grande, a tiny spot off the coast of Brazil has craggy coasts and dense rainforests may seem idyllic but it is overrun with snakes. A trip there is not allowed as it's the only place where one of the world ’s most venomous species, the golden lancehead, can be found.
The vast number of snakes has given the location its nickname Snake Island. The Brazilian Navy, however, stops anyone but snake experts from going there as it is said you will likely be dead after landing.
But there may not be as many many serpents on Snake Island as people have previously thought. And the golden lancehead might actually be disappearing with other serpents facing extinction according to researchers.
Ilha de Queimada Grande or 'Snake Island' off the coast of Brazil (Flickr Commons)The Island covers 106 acres and is 21 miles off Brazil’s southeastern coast with rocky shores but in the central hills and rainforests. But it wasn’t always an island and was part of the Brazilian mainland. 10,000 years ago.
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The venom of the golden lancehead snake is incredibly potent and five times stronger than its mainland relatives. It is said to have the fastest-acting poison of all pit vipers and its poision causes a quick death.
On Snake Island, there are no mammals so serpents have to catch birds to survive. There are 41 species of birds on the island but the vipers eat just two of them: the southern house wren and the Chilean elaenia.
The hugely poisonous Golden Lancehead snake which is prominent on the island (AFP via Getty Images)They are small and cautious and snakes with slow-acting venom saw their prey fly off to die elsewhere. But the the vipers’ venom evolved to becoming faster and faster acting over the thousands of years which passed.
Because no people are permitted to visit the island, experts don't know how fast a golden lancehead would kill an individual. But it's likely no-one on Snake Island made it out to tell the tale. In the early 1900s, there was a lighthouse on Snake Island to steer ships away from it. This meant meant someone had to man the facility.
In the 1920s Brazil’s Navy declared the island off-limits to almost everyone (Google.Maps)But in the 1920s, Brazil’s Navy declared it off-limits to virtually everyone. The island’s last inhabitants were evacuated when the lighthouse was fully automated with modern technology. But local stories claim that the last lighthouse keeper and his family died after snakes managed to get into their house through open windows.
Researchers once estimated there were 430,000 lanceheads on Snake Island. But recently it was suggested this number wasn't sustainable on the small island. More accurate estimates have lowered this to just to 4,000 snakes.
An aerial view of lha da Queimada Grande or 'Snake Island', near Brazil (Prefeitura de Itanhaém/Flickr)Some of the species, however, are listed as critically endangered. Researchers believe this is because they may be unhealthily interested in their own relatives snake incest a likely possibility.
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