Interesting Facts

According to a report in the journal Nature, the fossilised remains of the world's largest snake, which lived in the rain forests of north-east Colombia 58-60 million years ago, show that it was about the length of a bus. (They've called it the Titanoboa and it's estimated that it was 42ft (13m) long, weighed more than a tonne and it was so wide it would have reached up to a person's hips. To put it into perspective reticulated pythons - the world's longest snakes - can reach up to 32ft (10m) and green anacondas - the world's heaviest snakes - are lightweights at just 550lbs (250kg). I have heard of the film "Snakes on a plane", but they could make a new one called "The snake is a bus".)

According to research in the Public Library of Science Medicine 400,000 people are poisoned by snake bites worldwide. (20,000 people die every year. I'm glad I'm British, we only have the relatively harmless, and very shy, adder.)