Antidotes close to home

Inside a hollow wooden log — in an enclosure resembling a near-perfect habitat of evergreen forest — ‘Aragorn’, an approximately 14-year-old male king cobra, rests. The snake measures over 14 ft in length. He was rescued from the human habitat area of Agumbe Ghats four years ago for a special purpose: The extraction of his venom for research.

Despite being the world’s longest venomous snake, king cobras seldom bite. However, with growing cases of mishandling the snake in untrained attempts to rescue, it is becoming necessary for researchers to develop anti-venom for the species. 

Aragorn’s neighbours include Russell’s vipers, kraits, saw-scaled vipers and cobras (together known as the big four) at the serpentarium run by Liana Trust at Rathnapuri, Hunsur taluk in Mysuru district. These snakes are notoriously famous for their bites, resulting in the deaths of hundreds of humans every year across Karnataka and India.

Each venomous snake has a different venom composition, meaning the impact of their venom on the human body is different. While the cobra’s venom impacts the nervous system, as it is neurotoxic, viper venom attacks the blood, as it is haemotoxic. Studies have also found that the composition of the venom of the same species of snake varies in different regions due to multiple factors. Yet, currently, medical care units across India have been treating snakebite victims with the same antivenom, made from venom sourced from a single location.

While most recover, many others either succumb to the venom or end up permanently disabled. The research work at the serpentarium is helping produce anti-venom developed from snakes from across Karnataka. This, in turn, is expected to improve the efficacy of antivenom for the region.

Rescue and study

“We know very little about snakes,” says Gerard Martin, co-founder of the Liana Trust, backed by The Habitats Trust. With over 30 years of experience working with snakes, Martin says there is an urgent need for scientific understanding of snake behaviour to help prevent snake bites. This must be accompanied by comprehensive research of venom to produce anti-venom that could save lives.

The facility in Hunsur has permission to house nearly 350 snakes. Snakes rescued from conflict situations are sheltered here.

The trust has been authorised to collect the venom of not just the big four snakes from across Karnataka, but also three other venomous snakes — the king cobras, Malabar pit vipers and hump-nosed pit vipers — to help produce region-specific anti-venom in Karnataka. In collaboration with the Evolutionary Venomics Lab at the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, the trust has been conducting studies on the toxicity and DNA profiles of each venomous snake. The unit provides the extracted venom to only those agencies approved by the Karnataka Forest Department for either production or research, free of cost.

Presently, the prevailing method of venom extraction involves locals and tribal communities helping capture venomous snakes from the wild and extracting the toxin. At the Hunsur unit, the experts collect the venom only from captive and captive-bred snakes as per the guidelines of the World Health Organisation.

Each snake at the serpentarium is housed in a separate enclosure, providing them with an ideal habitat. To ensure that each snake remains healthy, the caretakers ensure only in-house bred feeds such as mice, rabbits, crickets and others.

Lisa Gonsalves, curator of the serpentarium, says they have developed an app that records every detail of the snakes housed at the unit. This includes information on when the snake was last fed, when its venom was extracted, last skin shed, mating, partners and other details.

A saw-scaled viper. DH Photos by author

One of the most important roles the team at the serpentarium aims to play is understanding the behaviour of the snakes. “Why do snakes bite? This is an important question that we want to get answered,” says Martin. Based on their telemetric study, especially of the Russell’s viper, the researchers hope to come up with solutions.

“Over the next few years, we hope to answer several questions. We want to test whether wearing gumboots during fieldwork will help in minimising deaths due to snake bites. Will the use of mosquito nets during the night prevent krait bites? Will a change in agricultural practice, along with improving the ecological balance, help in keeping the population of snakes in check?” says Martin. The behavioural study will also help prepare a mitigation strategy.

“In the next decade or so, hopefully, there will be synthesised antivenom and we will not have to depend on snakes and horses (to test anti-venom) anymore,” Martin adds. While the serpentarium is not open to the public, in the future, they hope to build an interpretation centre, where they can raise awareness about snakes.