Taipan

Taipans are the most poisonous snakes in the world and live in the north of Australia.

They eat rats, birds, lizards and small animals.

The taipan is a pale creamy colour on the head. They are light brown, dark brown, copper or olive in colour.

The Taipan snake has a bite which is 50 times more toxic than a cobra’s.

Taipans are the largest, fastest, most venomous snakes on earth; thoroughbreds of the snake world.

The Inland Taipan is the most venomous snake on earth. Believe it or not, the Coastal Taipan is less toxic than the Common Brown Snake but the size, volume of venom, and fang length of the Coastal Taipan still makes it the most dangerous.

The deadliest snakes in the world (they kill the most people) are probably the Russell's Viper, Carpet Viper and Common Cobra. Between them they account for tens of thousands of deaths annually.

By far the most venomous land snake on Earth. With an LD50 of 0.01 mg/kg, it is about 50 times as venomous as a Cobra and 950 times as venomous as a Diamondback Rattlesnake. The venom yield of a single bite is high enough to kill about 250,000 mice, or 100 men.

The danger posed by the Coastal Taipan was brought to Australian public awareness in 1950, when young herpetologist Kevin Budden was fatally bitten in capturing the first specimen available for antivenin research.


 * http://www.kidcyber.com.au/topics/taipan.htm


 * http://www.barefootbushman.com/ptaipan.htm

Taipan