Snakes are feared all over the globe. Although snakes have been domesticated in some parts of Asia and Africa, snakes are associated with dangerous venoms that can cause immediate death if not amputation. The venom and the effect of the venom differ with snake type. It is important to know about the existing snakes because when beaten by a snake, details of the snake will be influential in your treatment.
Snakes that are small and venomous with the ability to camouflage within their environment are the most lethal. They are poisonous yet difficult to see. It is like unforeseeable death. Those are the attributes of the green bush viper. The viper belongs to the Atheris genus consisting of venomous vipers.
The green bush viper is commonly found in tropical sub-Saharan Africa excluding Southern Africa. You can also find the snakes in some of the rainforest. The snakes are small with their adults measuring up to 40cm or 16inches from body to tail.
The distinct feature about the snakes that make them indefinable is their triangular head and their green colour. The green bush viper have relatively large eyes that have elliptical pupils. A scale of 1-3 rows separates the eyes from the supralabials and are 2-3 scales away from the nasals.
The snakes have a slender body that has tapering features. You can notice them with their slightly compressed features that make them smaller in size. If you look closely at the snakes you will realize that they have dorsal scales that are overlapping and have strongly keeled and apical pits of the scales covering their bodies. Assessing these scales laterally, you should see that they are smaller than middorsals.
These snakes live mostly in the rainforest regions. They are shy snakes; they live as far from human activity as possible. They live in areas that are very green to match their color. Although venomous, the snakes are not aggressive but react if disturbed.
The snakes have significantly declined in population with destruction of the forest environment. The destruction of their habitat makes the traditionally confined snake availed to a new environment where they suffer predation among other challenges that results to the reduction of their population. The snakes are strictly arboreal meaning they live in trees. In rare occasion they may be found on the ground or in shrubs.
Green bush viper feed on a variety of small amphibians, lizards, birds, rodents and other snakes. Depending on their environment, some have specialized on feeding on frogs while they are mostly opportunistic feeders. They attack they prey from their hanging position in the trees and devour them after injecting their venom into it. The snake usually swallows its prey.
The snakes are ovoviviparous meaning they reproduce by eggs that are developed within the body. They usually mate around the months between September and November and give birth to young live snakes in March and April.
The snake produces a venom that is strongly hemotoxic that causes pain and swelling to humans. The venom causes blood-clotting problems as well. The bite can cause serve haemorrhaging because the venom prevents the clotting of blood. Bites from these snakes are uncommon unless you go to their habitat.