Tooth & Claw: True Stories of Animal Attacks - Black Mamba Attack - Almost Certain Death

Episode Date: October 21, 2024

Wes has a couple of stories to share about a creepy animal making its first appearance on the show. If you wish to avoid major ouchies, we would advise that you do NOT get bitten by one of these snakes. If you can help it. If you are struggling with depression or thoughts of self-harm, reach out to someone who cares or to organizations who are there to help you. We love all. Dial 988 for help, or visit: https://988lifeline.org/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=onebox ~~ To advertise on the show, contact us! ~~ Tooth & Claw is brought to you by QCODE. Support the show and get access to an extensive library of exclusive episodes like this by supporting the show on Patreon or joining the Grizzly Club on Apple Podcasts. For the latest updates on the show and all things wildlife, follow us at toothandclawpod.com and social:  Instagram: @ToothandClawPodcast Twitter: @ToothandClawPod Wes: @GrizKid Jeff: @jefe_larson Mike: @mikey3ds Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Register today at richfield, Utah.com. Hello, everybody. Welcome to Tooth and Claw podcast. We have our wildlife biologist and just our favorite guy, Wes Larson. And he also happens to be my older brother. I'm Jeff Larson. And I was Wes's field tech working with black bears. And we got our best friend Mike Smith, who has never worked with bears. Never once?

Nope. Not one day. Not one measly minute. You should have introduced us as, the award-winning podcast. Oh, yeah. Wes, accepted award for the Summit Awards. Is that right?

Outdoor Media Summit. Wasn't it like world's best podcast? Listeners choice best podcasts for the outdoor. That's a big step up from like best road trip podcast. That is our last one. Yeah, we're just best overall. Now where you got everyone beat. Suck it in National Park after dark.

Don't we love them. Oh, yeah. Suck. It's probably wrong. phrase too. Yeah, I don't like that too much. Chew on that. We also just got back from another listener trip to Zimbabwe and Botswana. Botswana. Second in Zambia.

Yeah, we were in Zambia for a second. Some great safari. Yeah, I wanted to read out all the names of the people that joined us on that trip, can I? Sure. Okay, we had Chase, Wendy, Danielle, Megan, Stephanie, Carla, Jesse. Garrison Hunter, Deidre, Chad, Natalie, Katie, Stewart, Shea, Amy, Laura, Ben and Sarah. And Ben and Sarah actually got engaged on this trip, which was pretty cool in front of a bunch of elephants. Yeah, Sarah's favorite animal.

This is the best. It is cool. Hopefully they're still engaged. It was a good engagement. Yeah. West saw's first ever ever leopard, so that was cool. Yeah, I did. Jeff saw is second.

Second. Yeah. Let's not get into that. It's controversial, but yeah. Yeah. And then, yeah, no, just a great trip. Mike got real mad. What did you get mad about?

The last full day, he just, like, decided to wear full Halloween outfit with, like, black sleeves. Okay, hold on. Sure. And we're at dinner with the whole group, and I'm just like, hey, I... Breakfast. I like your shirt. Yeah, we're at breakfast. No, you...

Whoa. Hold on. I like, I like your shirt. No. And Mike was like, what are you talking about? There's nothing wrong with this shirt. Unbelievably inaccurate recounting of events. Jess, during October, which is the month of Halloween,

everybody could probably take a good guess as to why I was wearing like a Halloween-themed shirt. He's like, so what made you decide that wearing that shirt was a good idea? It's like, I don't know. I like it. And it's time, it's like the spooky season. Let me have it, you know. But you guys, neither of you can ever.

let me get away. Why are you attacking me again on this? I was on your side. I was on your side about something else too because then Jeff tried to say, Jeff tried to defend the way he asked that question as like the best possible way he could have done it and like walking up to someone and saying what made you wear that shirt today? Like what was going through your head when you put that on? That's how it was. What was going through your head? Such a passive aggressive way to like tell someone that you hate their outfit. So I was on your side, Mike. You gotta stop attacking me too.

I was just like, you went carry on only so you had to be real selective with like clothes you brought. That's true. And one of them was like a black under armor sleeves with a bright orange like Halloween shirt and it's just like, you know, for someone who says they hate attention,

it sure seemed like you're trying to steal my attention. So now we get to the bottom I just thought it was I thought it was apropos. I ever got a Halloween shirt. What made you put that on this morning? Probably how much I liked Mike's. I loved Mike's Halloween shirt,

so I got my own. You win, Jeff. You won the argument. It wasn't a real fight, but it was like something that, you guys, Wes, I don't know, we can be done with it. You guys hate the way I dress.

We can just leave it that. Mike, I don't. Oh, yeah. I compliment you pretty often. No, the thing that I make fun of you sometimes for is your hair. Because sometimes you just go and cut your hair in crazy ways. Yeah, that's fair. I'll let you guys have that one.

But I think I've commented positively more than negatively on his outfits. Sure, but that's a much different statement than what you just made. No, I think if someone, if I felt like I don't think I'm that negative to Mike on his outfits. But there are times where, like, you make some choices. Whatever. We've talked to too long about this. I dress like an idiot. Let's leave it at that. We had a great time in Africa. Everyone loves Snoopy.

We saw lots of animals. Well, it's hard when your mom dies, she can't dress you anymore. And that's where things went wrong. Yeah. Yeah. Our mom bought Jeff's Bulbosaur shirt that he's wearing right now. We had a great time. We had an amazing group again.

We've been so lucky on all three of our trips just to have really cool listeners that have joined us on all three. So thanks again, guys, for coming. It was great. We're still a little jet lagged. But, you know, today's story and topic is kind of a conglomeration of two things that happen this month. One being our Africa trip, because this is an African animal. Two, being that it's Halloween, as we just mentioned, it's spooky season. And this is a spooky-ass animal that we're going to talk about.

So just keep those things in mind. Way Wolf. It's a baradook. It's not a werewolf. The babadook, I don't think, is that scary, personally. The babadooks just, like, makes you depressed. Anyway, something I like to do in this time of year is to kind of do some creepier animals. So this is a creepy, a creepy crawly.

And it is, when we were in Africa, we talked to a lot of different people about the most dangerous animals. The animals that people say are the most dangerous. And we've talked about this a lot on the podcast. answers. You do get a lot of different answers. And I think there does tend to be a difference between like the animals that have killed the most people and then the most dangerous because those two aren't always the same. Like an African buffalo is probably more dangerous than like an elephant, but elephants kill more people. But in the whole of Africa, I can pretty confidently say that crocodiles are the like the large animal that's responsible for the most

deaths. Which hole? But the whole. Where's that local? All of it. W-H-O-L-E. Oh, my gosh. But you'll notice that I took time to specify to say large animal. Because if you include all animals, that list becomes a lot more complicated. And if you're including all of them, mosquitoes are definitely killing the most people. But that's kind of boring to talk about. But the next on the list would definitely be venomous snakes.

There are so many people bitten and killed by venomous snakes on the continent of Africa. that they're considered a neglected tropical disease by the World Health Organization, and up to 138,000 people die annually from venomous snake bites around the world. What? And about 30,000 of those deaths come from Africa, specifically sub-Saharan Africa. But you're more likely to get struck by lightning? No. Then bit by a snake, no.

Yeah, you're much more likely to be bit by a snake. Oh, where did I get that from? That was the shark attacks. Oh, okay. So 30,000 people. I was going to say lightning gets a lot of people. Vending machines too. 30,000 people is a lot.

Like that, that's a significant amount of people. When you think about it, I think elephants are responsible for about, I don't know, 500 deaths throughout Africa every year. So this is, I mean, snake bite is on a whole different magnitude of death. And there are a few species of snake within Africa that are responsible for the majority of those bites. Well, and like on our trip, too, like we went into a little African village. It's really cool and it was really interesting to see how they live. But their medicine room, they even had this snake bite thing.

And it's just like you cut the wound open and you like do all this stuff. And it's like, okay, yeah, that's not saving anybody's life for like a really venomous snake. Yeah. I'm actually going to bring that up later. But yes, that wasn't. No, it's fine. I think that's a good teaser. So there's a lot of different snakes that are responsible for these deaths, but there's a few that really have the lion's share of those deaths.

And some of them are in the Adder family, not lions. So snakes like the death adder, the puff adder, kill a lot of people in Africa. But there's one that's really famous, that's become famous around the world because of its lethality. And that is the black mamba. It's one of my all-time favorite snakes. And it's the snake we're going to be talking about today. Yeah, they're pretty cool. They are cool.

Kobe kind of put them on the map, though. Kobe? I think they're on the map before that. But, you know, for me, I think had we been able to see any animal in Africa, I think I would have wanted to see a Black Mamba. It would be so cool to see one. It's very high on my list. Yeah.

So there are a lot of stories about Black Mamba bites, a lot of facts and myths, too. So we're going to go over a few stories and a lot of information about the snake. It was definitely an animal where my research gave me a whole new appreciation for them. I learned a lot putting this episode together. And there's a lot of papers in the literature about them, especially medical papers, because this is deemed a snake of medical importance. So we'll probably end up devoting multiple episodes to Black Mamas in the future. But we're really just going to skim the surface today.

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Get started at Redfin.com. Own the dream. So we are going to start with the story from 2008. In 2008, Nathan Layton decided it was time to find. follow his childhood hero and pursue an education and wildlife. And that hero was also one of my main heroes, Steve Irwin. 28-year-old Nathan had decided that he wanted to be a South African safari guide, and he was going to start an intensive year-long training course in South Africa.

And yeah, when I say he wanted to follow Steve Irwin, too, I just mean like work with animals, you know. So to become a South African safari guide, it's an intensive year-long training course, which involves six months of classroom training and six. months of bush training. And this particular course was conducted by a company called Bushwise. His girlfriend Laura also joined him on the trip, and she was taking the same course. They're really excited for this adventurous career that they're just starting. The Bush portion of their training was especially exciting for them because they'd be learning how to deal with all sorts of potentially dangerous animals, everything from elephants to hippos, leopards, lions,

and venomous snakes. But that in-person real-life training started a bit early when on On March 4th, 2008, when they were doing the classwork, some of the faculty in the college where the safari training was happening captured a black mamba in a corridor outside of a classroom. The mamba was placed inside of a tuckerware, but not long after there was some excitement when the mamba managed to escape from this Tupperware enclosure and was trying to get back outside and was found in the hallways of the college. So a lot of these students...

At this point, it's probably like not a happy snake. Not a happy snake. No. And these are students that are like trying to learn about this kind of stuff. So for them to like finally have something exciting like this,

they all crowded this snake. They're really excited to see a black mamba. And Nathan actually had some experience around snakes. So he decided to help his instructors recapture this mamba. And their idea was that they would put it in a large glass jar

because they really wanted to be able to show some of the other students the snake, kind of pass it around the college, and a live black momba was just too attractive of a teaching tool to turn down. So as it slithered down the hall, these students are gathering around it, and Bushwise instructor, Nellie DeCocke,

didn't realize that was her name until I just read it. Leaving that in. Asked Nathan to grab a glass jar and place the mamba inside of it. And during that time... Easy, pizzy. She was going to put the mamba. Sorry, I said that wrong.

grab a glass jar and then she would put the mamba inside of it. Oh, okay. So she grabbed the mamba with a snake capturing stick. I'm guessing it's one of the, like, there's some that have like clamps on the end that you're actually not really supposed to use with them because they can injure them, but I'm guessing that's what it was.

And the mamba wrapped itself around the stick, and she had to use another one to get it uncurled and safely dropped into this large glass jar. It was a little unclear to me just what role Nathan was playing in all of this, but he was asked to help the instructor and at some point during all of this commotion the snake made contact with Nathan he says that he remembers it like brushing up against him

and when the dust had settled and the snake was in the jar the lecture was about to resume Nathan asked Nellie if a bite from a black mamba would bleed which probably isn't what you want to hear if you're in structure she got a bit nervous and she told him that there wouldn't be much blood but there'd be a puncture mark.

And then she, of course, asked Nathan immediately if he had been bitten. And he showed her his right index finger where he did have a prick mark that he thought could be from the snake. And she asked him if he was feeling any tingling or dizziness, how his eyesight was. He said he felt fine. And she said that he needed to tell her if he started feeling anything at all. But then they just went right back to the lecture. Which is a bad idea. I'm sure this is obviously like hindsight's 2020, whatever.

I'm sure, like, if the person doesn't think they got bit, you would just want to continue. But I would say, if you are ever in a situation where there's a possibility someone got bitten by, like, one of the most dangerous snakes on Earth, just go to the hospital, regardless of like. It's kind of weird. Like, your hand is, like, not a place where it's like, I don't know if its mouth was by my hand or not, you know. It feels like you know. The thing about Black Mamas is they strike so quick and, like, even just a little. tiny bit of its fane catching you can inject some venom that I did notice like in a lot of these people didn't really even realize they'd been bitten by these snakes which is pretty

crazy. All right so Nathan rejoins the lecture and for about 30 minutes he felt fine and even participated in the lecture and was asking questions and whatnot and then after about half an hour he approached Nellie and he whispered to her that he was losing his vision and that his eyesight was super blurry and then a few seconds later he collapsed on the floor and his breathed had become super labored. Laura, his girlfriend, ran to his side and Nellie ran for help to try and get a first aid kit, and as she left the room, she could see Nathan writhing on the floor and gasping for air. They did not have any anti-venom on site at the college, so Nellie called for help,

and emergency services rushed to bring Mamba-specific anti-venom to the college to hopefully stabilize and save Nathan. But with him, the venom was working really quickly, and his girlfriend and his classmates watched in horror, as it did this terrible Rube Goldberg on his nervous system, shutting down pathways between neurons and muscles really quickly and leading to a collapse of his cardiovascular system. His heart seized, he twitched one last time on the floor, and then died in front of Laura, his friends, and his instructor.

And it all happened in minutes after he complained about the blurry vision. Jeez, wow. So one of the most fear-inducing facts about the Black Mamba is also probably the main reason it's gained such a reputation among venomous snakes. And that fact is that it can be, it's almost 100% lethal without treatment. So they are clutch, yes. If you get bit by this snake and you don't get treatment quickly,

there's a very, very good chance that you're going to die. And that is scary. That's unique. It's unique. When you think about it, we don't really have anything like that in the United States. pretty much all of our snakes aside from the eastern coral snake

and you have to push the coral snake to bite you, the rest of our snakes if you get bit you got a lot of time to get anti-venom and you're probably going to survive regardless. Like you're probably not going to die from a rattlesnake bite. You could, but anyway,

this thing is like death incarnate. You know, this is death and living flesh. Yeah, but like Africa snakes got to like eat much bigger meals. They don't know. Like elephants and drafts. Like rodents and birds. and stuff. They're not eating elephants and traps. They do have a lot bigger threats.

Anyway, because this is such a potent venom in the snake, it has led... We're going to get to that. It's led to a lot of justified fear, and sometimes that fear can even spill into hate. There are a lot of people living around these snakes that really don't like them. Hate leads to suffering. Yeah, that's true, man. Suffering. Whatever, Yoda says it. You don't want that. I do want that. Basically what I'm getting at, though, and I'm guilty of this for sure,

is that in the United States and throughout the Western world, we don't really have a threat like this. And so it's really easy for wildlife experts like myself to kind of preach tolerance and coexistence with venomous snakes. But for people that are living in rural sub-Saharan Africa or rural India or Indonesia or these different hotspots with venomous snakes, this snake and other snakes really represent an existential and constantly. present threat to those people.

And it's almost hard to imagine how that relationship affects their daily living in those places. When we were just in Botswana, like I knew that Botswana and Zimbabwe had robust black mamba populations. And we stayed in this one hotel where it was the one that had like a lot of kind of foliage and trees and stuff. And I remember one night walking back to my room and just thinking, I could step on a black mamba right now.

Like that could happen. Yeah. And there's a good chance I would. die. And like I've never really thought about that before. Like I've never had to. And yeah, that's interesting. You'd have about an hour probably to like say goodbye to people and stuff if you didn't get anti-venin. And that's crazy, you know. It actually is longer than an hour. We're going to get to that too. But it is, it is wild to think about. Luckily, antivenin does exist for this animal. And when it's used properly and quickly, it can be really effective. So I found a medical study from

2021 that looked at 29 cases of confirmed invenomations by black mamas, so bites that did have venom in them. And of those 29 cases, 26 of the people survived. So that's an 84% survival rate, but it should be noted that this was a medical paper that used medical reports. So most of these bites were from people that received medical treatment. And 25 of those 29 people were able to get anti-venom. And not all of them got the right time. So you're saying like some of the more rural places might have like bites that weren't in that report and that weren't treated exactly and we're going to at some point in one of these episodes we're going to get into this whole idea of like there's a shortage of anti-venom in a lot of these places and a shortage of quality anti-venom so

and it's really expensive so there's a lot of barriers for these people even get antivenin and just so everyone knows I say that word really quickly because I always want to say anti-venom but the word is actually anti-venin. Really? V-E-N-I-N. Yeah. Which doesn't make any sense, but it is. Yeah. What the heck?

That just turns your whole world on it, doesn't it? That was crazy. I don't know how to remember that. All right. Basically, all this goes to say that if you get the right kind of treatment and you get it quickly enough, you still have a very decent chance of surviving a black Mamba bite, even though they have some of the most potent venom of any snake in the world. But I said earlier that they have almost 100% success or death rate if you're not treated. And I said almost because there are records of people surviving a bite even without antiven. And one of those occurred in 1998. This episode is brought to you by Netflix. Most valuable promotions in Netflix are hosting a blockbuster triple headliner Saturday, May 16th.

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He was just in his student days, and he almost didn't make it past his student days when he ran into a black Mamba in the South African bush in 1998. Danny was tracking white rhinos in the Fabini tributary of Kruger National Park, and he found himself standing in waste-deep water in a river looking for a safe place to cross.

In Africa, I think a safe place to cross brings a whole different feeling because you could be face to face with hippos, buffalo, exactly, elephants, crocs. So he's really scanning this river to look for large dangerous animals and as he's doing that, he hardly noticed the much smaller and much more dangerous animal near his knees. When he finally did notice the snake,

it was disappearing into the reeds to his left and he immediately clocked it as a very fast and very large black mamba. Then after taking a few more, steps out into the water, he felt a strong pain and a burning sensation under his knee. And he pulled his shorts up to see four blue purple holes and some leaking blood. And immediately he knew what had happened. And he knew he was in a lot of trouble. Luckily, the water washed it out.

Yeah, I don't think that's enough. It's going to need a little bit more than that. He was far from his truck. He was alone. And all he had was a knife, a gun, and some tracking equipment. Oh, shoot the venom out. out of his... Yeah, just blast it out.

That's what Jason Statham would do. Yeah, I would. He'd only just begun his studies, but he was well-versed enough in African wildlife to know that he probably only had minutes before this venom was going to start working. And sure enough, a few minutes later, Danny started tasting a metallic taste in his mouth,

and he had a pins and needles feeling on his mouth and its fingertips. And I listened to a few, like, YouTube videos of people that have been bit by the snake, and they all describe it as just the weirdest kind of electrical feeling that's pulsing through your fingers and your lips and stuff. Then as he started trekking back toward his pickup truck, he felt almost all of the hairs on his body stand up on end, and he stopped walking to give himself time to make a decision. What decision do you guys think that is? It's hard to really have to me options.

Just walk or don't walk? That's it. That was his decision. He actually thought I'm either going to go to my truck Or I'm going to go sit down under that tree And write a little letter to everyone I love And die

That's pretty much what he was deciding Because what he didn't want to do Is like keep walking to his truck And then just pass out And not have the time to like say goodbye Or say what happened or anything But he really didn't want to give up So he knew that he was going to keep pushing forward

And hope that he could get to help in time So after he deliberated for a second, he kept going. And even though he knew it wouldn't help, he did cut into these bites with his knife in an attempt to remove the venom, which we're going to talk about more later. He then used his belt as a tourniquet.

The one guy who lived with? Yeah, I know. Come on, dude. It's probably because of this next thing. He used his belt as a tourniquet and put around his upper thigh. He did write a really quick note about what happened to him

because he was in such a remote location and he was really confident that search and rescue you wouldn't find him before like hyenas and jackals would find him. So even with this note, he thought, if I die out here, probably no one will ever really know why. Although he really wanted to just sprint back to the truck, he forced himself to walk slowly and to control his breathing.

I need to do a big correction corner. We've done a number of venomous snakes, and I always am saying, you know, when they bite you, the venom goes into the bloodstream. That's actually not what happens with a lot of snakes. and I learned that while researching black mamba. The venom actually goes into your lymphatic system. So with black mama bites, when they bite you, the venom goes into limp vessels that run parallel

to your blood vessels, and that's kind of how it's transported through your body. And that's especially true with neurotoxic elapids like the black mamba. Black mamba are elapid snakes. And the speed at which these fluids and proteins and everything in the vans, Venom travel through the lymphatic system isn't really dependent on your heart rate, but rather

the contractions of your muscles. So the more you move, the faster the venom gets pumped through your body. Well, if you don't move ever, when it, after a bite you. It would still get you, but it wouldn't go through as quickly. Okay. Something's adding up because while we were in Botswana, one of our tour guides, I don't know if either of you were in my same car, but they talked about how mangis, mongooses. They have a really high count of lymphatic acid

Or however you like they have a lot of that And what they do when they get bit by Black Mamba He said they just lay down for like five minutes And then they're like good to go Yeah So I guess they know to not like scurry around And get that kind of working through their system Yeah

But yeah well that's crazy That's really cool actually And I'm simplifying all of that But it was really really interesting for me to learn That a lot of Venoms move through the lymphatic vessels rather than the blood vessels. And it really makes me look at this whole envenomation process a lot differently.

And it should help you understand why cutting and sucking your blood is going to do absolutely nothing when it comes to treating snake bites. All right. Taking a nap, though. It would help, but it's also like not getting you any closer to help. Unless people are already like going to help you.

All right. So for... Talk to someone in your dreams. Yeah. That could have. Sure. Yeah. Who would be in your dreams?

Like the police? Tell the police. They'd probably take naps at the same time. I like to imagine just some like cop with a box of donuts on his passenger seat, just taking a nap in his cruiser and having like an ESP connection with a snake bite victim. That's what I'm saying. That might actually be. He bolts awake and he's like, someone needs my help.

All right. So for Danny, he's really stuck between a rock and a hard place. Because the more he moves, the faster the venom's going to move through his system and attack his nervous system. But he also needs to get to help as quickly as possible. And by the time he does reach his truck, he has severe tunnel vision and he's sweating profusely. And he's pretty deep in the bush, but he knew that he was close to a tourist road nearby in the park. He'd like off-rooted. So he speeds off just ripping through like streams, bouncing off rocks.

almost passing out at the wheel. And when he gets to this tourist road, which is a dirt road, he's doing 80 miles per hour on it, and it takes him a while to actually find another vehicle. And when he finally does see another vehicle, he knows that he can't let them drive by, so he forces them off the road and then jumps out of the car shirtless with a gun in his hand.

Whoa. So you know if you're these people, you're like, oh, we're about to die. This guy's going to kill us. but he managed to explain himself to these people who were two women and one man and they race him to the nearest ranger station where he finds his friend Tom Yassel and he tells Tom what had happened and Tom runs into the other room and tells his wife that a black mamba had been Danny and what Tom hadn't really thought about was that

their son was also named Danny so when he tells his wife oh a black mama bit Danny she didn't take that news very well and he had to calm her back down he's like no it's And then she's like relieved. Oh, that guy? I don't care for that guy. Yeah. So they came up with a plan. A helicopter wasn't available.

The nearest hospital with necessary equipment and personnel was a short drive away. So they pile into a car and they did the drive in record time. And he arrived at the hospital about two hours after he had been bitten. General paralysis is starting to set in when he arrives. And when he initially told the doctors that it was a black mom, a bite. they were skeptical because it had been about two hours and they were like, oh, you should be dead by now. And he was still like somewhat mobile. General paralysis would be a good wrestler name.

Like that's your character. That is a good wrestler name. Or like a post-punk band too. Yeah, that's all right. It would be cool. So when the doctors remove his tourniquet, his condition actually deteriorated really rapidly. His speech slurred. He couldn't swallow.

And he actually had heard this story about a. a friend that had been bitten by a venomous snake in the past and had slipped into total paralysis and coma-like symptoms. But that friend had been fully coherent and awake when he heard the doctors talk about like switching off machines because he was in a coma. Oh man. So basically this friend was like paralyzed, but he could still see, feel, and touch, but he couldn't move or talk, which is like a nightmare.

You know, there's like nothing worse than that. There's that one guy that had that for like 16 years. and then snapped out of it. Yeah. And his mom would just like say really mean things and he couldn't say anything. Really? That sucks. Yeah, it's bad.

He's like, I forgive my mom. I had to have been really hard for her. Jeez, that is rough. This story had really stuck with Danny though. I'm sure it'll stick with me and everyone. But with his last little ability to talk, Danny told Tom not to let the doctors switch off the machines. And then he entered pretty much a.

full body paralysis. And he said that he remembered he could like see here in touch. And the only time he would see anything is when the doctors would like pull open his eyelids and then suddenly he could see and then they'd like push him closed again. Yeah. There's actually a Stephen King. And the doctors are like he's not there. Yeah.

They thought he was like entering a coma. A coma. It reminds me of it reminds me of a Stephen King short story called autopsy in room. for where there's like a man that's thought to be dead and they start like doing an autopsy on him but he had been bitten by a snake that made him paralyzed and looked like he was dead all right danny is fully awake but the outside world he seemed like he was in a coma and he remembered that he had sweat pooling around him in this plastic sheeting and it made him really cold but he had no way of telling the doctors to turn the fan off finally a friend visited him and begged him to give him a

sign if he was still in there and Danny managed to slightly move his foot and his friend realized that he was still aware and not in a coma. And that kind of started his recovery. He slowly regained muscle use. And after a while... Yeah, I thought of killed Bill as well.

Yeah. Yeah. And she was the Black Mamba, too. Yeah, I know. I was going to use that in that category. He slowly regained muscle use and after a while he was removed from the ventilator. He's placed in his parents' care.

And although the sweating continued for a while, he made a full recovery. He never received any anti-venom from what I read, and I really have no idea why that is. When he got back into the field, the first thing he saw was a large black mamba stretched out across the road. No way.

Oh, dude. Well, at least at this point, he knows they can't kill him. He's invincible. Like that guy you're going to talk about later, not this episode. Lots of places can expose you to identity theft. Oh, no.

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Let's get in some facts. Let's do a little biology. Black Mamas lived throughout sub-Saharan Africa. They're fairly widespread and abundant, so they're actually an IUCN species of least concern. They're large snakes. They're the second longest venomous snake in the world after the king cobra. Wow. Yeah.

I didn't know that. They are really long. Like when I see them in like zoos or whatever, every time I'm like, I forgot how long these guys are. Yeah. And a lot of zoos don't even keep them just because they are like very defensive snakes and they do have such a toxic venom. They can get up to like 3.8 meters long, though, which is really long. Oh, wow. It's like a pretty substantial snake.

Yeah. Their name mamba comes from the Zulu word imamba, which means tree reptile with many scales. They're typically a grayish brown in color. They can look kind of black when they get dark enough. Like everything I read was like, oh, they're not black mamba because of their color. And it's like they are kind of black looking. Let's give them a little bit of credit. Yeah, I kind of like grays as black.

Yeah. light black or something. Right. Do you guys, so there is a thing that every single article again said, the reason they're called black mamba is because of this specific characteristic. Do you guys know what it is? Ooh. It's one of their coolest features in my opinion.

Their eyes are black? It's not. It's the inside of their mouth. When they open their mouth, the inside is like a dark black color. It's really cool looking and they use it to intimidate threats. Like a lot of other elapid snakes. they have coffin-shaped heads with large round eyes and circular pupils. So when we're talking about elapids, we're talking about like cobras, coral snakes, crates,

mambas, all those snakes are in the alapid family. Tipans. They're like some of them more like potent venoms in the world too. They live on both the ground and in the trees. They're fast-moving and active snakes. They mostly birds and small mammals, but they'll also take other snakes. They really don't have that many natural. Predators aside for some bird species, mongoose, which we mentioned, honey badgers, which we mentioned, and crocodiles have all killed black mambas.

But it's rare that they'll be killed by anything aside from birds of prey. Like a lion won't mess with them. No, I, so I was going to bring this up later, but I found some videos of lions getting bit by black mambas. Like people filming lions walking, then all of a sudden the lion like jumps and you can tell. And one of those videos, the lion like collapses and starts just like writhing. Oh, man. And then there's one where the lion actually dies. Yeah.

So they, lions don't mess with them. Nothing messes with these guys because they are. Lions kind of mess with everything. Yeah. Yeah. But not with black mambus. You think a lion would mess with Texas though? No.

Oh, no. I mean, tigers, do. There's like more tigers in Texas than in the wild or something. To me, that feels like Texas messes with tigers. than anything. All right. Yeah, that's a good little aside. They're active during the day,

but they'll almost always try to retreat when they hear or feel humans approaching. They have a really aggressive reputation, but a better way to put that, in my opinion, is that they're aggressively defensive. If they feel cornered or threatened, they'll spread a bit of skin around their necks, kind of like a cobra.

They open their mouths, and they'll strike at any threat that comes too close. They hiss, too. They make this really low, kind of like whiz. It's like pretty scary. Yeah.

They often bite multiple times and so quickly that the intruder doesn't even see the strikes. And like a lot of venomous snakes, they'll bite as soon as they feel immediately threatened. So a lot of those bites are a result of someone stepping on a snake or getting too close to one.

And they are capable of delivering dry bites but from what I read, it seems like they more often than not deliver some venom. They have especially potent neurotransing neurotoxic venom. When you're bitten by a black mamba, they'll generally deliver about 100 to 120 milligrams of venom. And a lethal dose for someone that's probably like 150 pounds or a 68 kilogram person is about 20 milligrams. So in an average bite, a black mom is delivering enough venom to kill like five to 10 people. They can kill a lot of people, which is one bite.

Holy cow. As it enters your lymphatic system, it immediately begins. its work on your overall nervous system. It generally takes about 10 to 15 minutes for symptoms to start appearing. There's a lot of different neurotoxins and cardio toxins in black mamba venom. And there are even some specific proteins that are named after mamba's themselves. But most of what their venom does is attack neurons that control your muscles. So part of like that paralysis is this venom is actually attacking the synapses between the neurons and the muscles. So they can't communicate anymore. So you're, muscles like don't work because your brain can't tell them to work anymore. So that's part of

what their venom's doing. That's gay. Yeah, it's really scary. That's really simplifying it, but that's kind of what happens. I read a lot of papers and stuff about this, but I kind of walked away with my head spinning. But basically, it's attacking the communication between your brain and your muscles. Those papers sound neurotoxic a little? Yeah, they were a little neurotoxic. It attacked my brain as well. some of those specific proteins to mamba venom do some really wonky stuff though for example the mamba intestinal toxins and this toxin called momboligan reduces your pain response so that actually makes it so you don't feel a lot of pain and in all the stories i read people didn't report a ton of pain which is unique for snake bites in our other ones like

the lion seemed to the line was just like twitching and stuff because of the muscle thing I think it, yeah, who knows if it was in pain. Good point. But it's kind of cool. Like, I think that's neat that this animal has like this pain inhibitor built into its venom. And that's the reason they're a snake of special interest to the World Health Organization and to medical professionals, because they think that they might be able to develop pain medications from mamba venom. Oh, cool.

Yeah. You know, it seems like a one of those drastic partners. I'll keep my opioids, thank you. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Just give me my first. Just kidding, everyone. Don't take pink colors. Yeah.

Yeah, don't abuse them. Yeah, let's go with that. Let's talk a little bit about symptoms. There's a general cascade of symptoms that people often experience after black mamba and venomation. First, they often report a metallic taste in their mouth, drooping eyelids, blurred vision, and then constricted pupils. Slurred speech often follows with heavy sweating, difficulty swallowing, and shortness of breath.

Then you might experience difficulty handling your saliva. So like I think that just means like you're drooling or whatever. I don't really understand it. You're like kind of fumbling it around in your hands. Can't handle the saliva. Body fingers. Full body muscle twitching. Paralysis, vertico, drowsiness, loss of consciousness,

respiratory paralysis and cardiac arrest. It's a lot of bad things. Yeah, I don't want any of those. Yeah, the main way that people die is they like exsciate. Exficiate. How come I can't say that? Asphyxiate. Esphyxiate.

There we go. They stop breathing. And then people also have heart attacks. Other symptoms can include red eyes, nausea, vomiting, goosebumps. Oh. And Mike's favorite. What's your favorite symptom, Mike? Oh, give me diarrhea.

Yep. How many points is that on the old family feud board? 100 points. Griffin door. Yes. Points to Griffindor. Griffin door wins the cup. The diarrhea cup.

In 2023, a Black Mamba entered a classroom in Zimbabwe and bit a 17-year-old high school student who was subsequently rushed to a nearby clinic. The teenager died on the journey and her death occurred within an hour of being bitten by the snake. So while collapse usually occurs within the first hour, death usually doesn't happen for like seven to 15 hours, but it can happen a lot sooner, like with this girl.

And then these deaths that happen really quickly can also be a result of allergy to the proteins and the snake bites. There's a popular YouTuber in September 2018, a reptile keeper and YouTuber Ryan Subbrien, who's bitten by a black mamba, who's milking the snake for venom, He was allergic to the venom. He went into anaphylactic shock and died.

Oh. All right. Speaking of YouTubers, we got one more story. This one does come with a suicide and an assault warning. So if either of those things, if you don't want to hear a story about either of those things, you can skip this one. I thought it was going to be like Mr. Beast survives one million snake bites. Or Cody, Coyote Peterson pretends to get by a black mama. If he does that, if he's like,

I'm going to take a bite from a black mama, then respect. Yeah. All right. But until then. Yeah, until then. That's making fun. We've been too hard on poor coyote. All right.

In 2011, Arslan Valiv, a 25-year-old living in St. Petersburg, Russia, created a YouTube channel showing off his impressive private collection of snakes and other reptiles. His girlfriend, Kachia, helped him run in his channel and would sometimes appear in videos as well. From what I can tell his videos are no longer online, but from the old thumbnails and materials I could find. He had a fair amount of venomous snakes in his collection. Most notably, I saw pictures of a black mamba and king cobras.

In 2016, five years later, Arslan and Katia create a new channel called Bobcat TV that mostly focused on exotic mammals like lynx. And Katya was the main personality on that channel, but Arslan would show up quite a bit as Well, it grew quickly, and today the channel actually has over 1.1 million subscribers, and mostly consist of videos of Kaccia playing with different wildcats that she owns. She's really pretty, and it's just a lot of videos of, like, a pretty Russian girl with, like, links and Puma and stuff. Recipe for success.

Yeah, it is. Arslan and Kachia got married, and from their videos in online presence, it seemed like they were living their dream life until it all came crumbed. down in 2017. Something in their relationship happened that caused a split. Some say that it was because they were living in pretty terrible conditions

because of all the animals and animal enclosures and that Kachia had just had enough. And other articles say there may have been some sort of infidelity. But either way it seemed like they split up and it was because of Kachia. Like she was done, she wanted a divorce. Arslan

was having a really hard time with this and then Kachia started dating someone else. which really threw him into a tailspin. And in the summer of 2017, he showed up to where Kacha was staying with a girlfriend. He forced himself into the apartment and a physically assaulted Kachya, leading to a concussion and a lot of bruising.

She had to go to the hospital. Neighbors stopped him, but he managed to steal her car keys, her laptop, and he broke her phone, and then he went home and deleted her YouTube channel. She went to the hospital. Yeah, which sucks, because I think it was like her moneymaker.

It's like getting rid of her job. And she did get it back, though. Good. She went to the hospital, she reported the assault, and following the attack, she stated on her Instagram that there had actually been a pattern of abuse, and that had been the real reason for the breakup. And a few weeks later, Arslan then posted an apology to his Instagram, and his apologies really long.

I read the whole thing. He talks about how much he messed up, how he knows she's much better off without him. and you can tell from this apology that he's not in a good place. Like he's really spiraling. And he did some bad things. He did some bad stuff. Yeah. Yeah.

Following this apology, there did seem to be a brief moment of peace between this couple. And Arslan even appeared in one of the Bobcat TV videos. But then the day after that video was posted, the couple officially filed for divorce. And Arslan announced that he would be doing a special live stream with one of his favorite and most Deadly Snakes, the Black Mamba. The stream opens. I had to have Jeff look this up for me because I was having a hard time finding it.

And if there's someone that knows how to find crazy videos online, that's Jeff. I know one website, but it has a lot of stuff. Jeff already had it bookmarked the URL. He's like, our son? Yeah, I got that one. Yeah.

Yeah. I don't look at the site anymore, but when I was on my strong anti- I depressed and so I was like I gotta feel something. Yeah, cool. It's fine. I'm not judging you. Yeah, but I feel like I got to explain it to the listeners.

This particular stream opens with Arcelon apologizing again for the way that he treated Kacha. He tells the audience that she hadn't cheated on him and he pretty much says that he was responsible for the conditions that led to their breakup. He expresses his sadness, his love for Kachia, and then he walks off camera and lets his black mama bite him on the finger. When he returns, he expresses some shock at what he had just done, and he shows his bleeding finger to the camera.

And then he tells the audience, catches phone number, and says that he wants to see her before he dies. This total video is seven minutes long, but what you see is he shows his finger, you see him start to shake. You do see him start to, like, really struggle to breathe. His breathing gets really labored. and then toward the end of the video his eyes start rolling back into his head he walks off camera and stumbles out of the house and collapses

viewers did call cacha and an ambulance the ambulance got there first and it rushed unconscious arslan to the hospital cacha arrived not long after and then she went to the hospital but by the time she arrived arslan had already died from this invention pretty dramatic that's tragic that's kind of crazy. Yeah. This is one I've had bookmarked pretty much since we decided to do this podcast. It's one that has been on my radar for a while. Yeah. I feel so sorry for her. Yeah. That's like such a shitty, you know, to say like to get bit by the snake and then said,

all I want to do is like see her again. It's just like a terrible pressure. I don't know. And I, you know, I feel terrible for him and his family too, but I think that's like a huge thing. And I know his parents kind of blamed her too, which is terrible as well. Or his dad blamed her. His cat in like the background of the video didn't really care. No. His cat didn't know what's going on. Just hanging out.

I feel like a dog, dogs can like kind of sense that stuff. And like a dog might like come up and start barking. But the cat was just like, he's acting kind of weird. Yeah. Whatever. Yeah. I think it didn't really, it either didn't know or it. didn't care.

Yeah. All right. That's it for the stories. There are more out there, but I think that's all we're going to tell for today. I will say too with like that one, I know probably talking about the video and whatever makes people feel like, oh, maybe I should like look for it. I would just say like even like just on Google images, like you get the idea and like you can just look his name up and it's kind of, I don't know.

Yeah, like Jeff said, it's... If you feel that, you know. Yeah, it's not like a particularly, like, compelling video either. No, like you were saying. Yeah. And obviously, like, if anyone out there is struggling with suicidal thoughts, ideations, any of those things, all three of us want to really encourage you to get help, you're cared about. There's people that love you.

We love you. Give your black mambas to your friends. Keep them away from yourself. Yeah. Yeah, don't have black mamas at home. And we'll post a hotline number in our show. notes if you are feeling like you need to talk to someone. All right.

We're going to do our ouches, but we're just going to do him for Danny because he's our only person today that didn't die. So Danny is the one that almost ran out with his gun and shirtless and everything. You guys remember him? Went into a coma. Wiggled his toe. Yeah, it sounds like there was never crazy pain, but man, the whole like paralysis while you're like conscious is like that's intense.

It is. But it would be kind of cool to experience that, too, and, like, tell people that you've had that experience? I don't know. No, I'm not going to. All right. How many ouchies? I'm going to give him six. Okay.

Same. Mental ouchies. A lot of mental ouchy, but not a lot of physical. Yeah. I like that. You know, just to keep the spooky theme going, I'll give him a six, too. Six, six, six. Yeah.

I wonder if he, uh, whatever happened to that. note. Do you think he... Yeah. It'd be an interesting kind of scrapbook material or something, you know? Yeah. Because he didn't pen the full note, but he did say, like, I've been bitten by a black mom or whatever.

Yeah. But no, it would be really weird to have your body, like, shut down on you but still be, like, fully aware. So, yeah, I agree. Six. All right. Let's get into our categories. Your favorite black mamba in pop culture. Yeah, mine's

kill bill. Yeah. Be trust. Kiddo. Beatrix. I think it's funny that like, so it's like all female assassins, right? Most people know what Kill Bill is by now. But one of the assassins is like a black, actually a black lady. And she's like mad that she wasn't named Black Mama. That's a good joke.

Yeah. She's like the copperhead or something, right? Yeah. It's a good name. Yeah. Still cool. That's a great pick. Mike, do you have one?

Mike, I like those sunglasses you just put on. Yeah, those are cool, Mike. watch this. Oh, flipped him up. I do like them. I don't have... The Kill Bill was the only thing that came to mind. Does the Mamba candy,

is there like a black licorice flavor? I'll go with that. No, but we'll count it, sure. Did you like Kobe? No, I didn't care for Kobe. Not really at all. But there is a recent... Crazy fact, the woman in like the huge controversy,

if you know anything about Kobe. Toby went to Mike's high school with Mike. Yeah, she was two years ahead of me. Anyway, there was a K-pop, a big K-pop single that just came out. I think it was called Black Mamba. Hit like a trillion views in 10 minutes or something. It's a big deal to some people, not really for me. Wasn't there like a wrestler who had a Black Mamba sock hand?

There was a sock-hand wrestler. I don't know if it was a Black Mamba, though. That guy was cool. All right, my pick is going to be, there's this movie. I've talked about it on the podcast before. It's called Venom, but it's not like the symbiote venom with Tom Hardy and stuff. It's from 1981. Yeah, Venom the Last Dance.

That's my favorite Black Mamba. Funny enough, though, recently Jesse got really into the Venom movies and watched both of them. Yeah, and she is stoked for the third one, which is not what I ever would have expected from her, but I'm really excited to see her excited. Yeah, that's great. No, this movie is from 81. It stars like Oliver Reed, Klaus Kinski, who Werner Herzog said it's famously easy to work with. It's a joke. That's actually the opposite.

Anyway, it's a great movie. It's about these like terrorists who in the process of kidnapping a child, they get trapped in a house with the black mamba. Like this kid had ordered what he thought was like an African house snake, but it was actually a black mamba. And then they barricade themselves inside this house. and the Mamba gets out. And it's a crazy movie, and I really liked it. So it's called Venom from 1981.

All right. Next category is going to be, because it's spooky season, your scariest scenes involving a snake. It can be from TV, movie, books, whatever you want. Scariest scene involving a snake. I think I know yours, Jeff.

I kind of have two. Is one of them Fire Starter? Yeah. The book, Stephen King, Fire Starter. My origin story with snakes was like as a little kid A listener told me the name of this movie But I forgot it But there's this movie about like

Just like all the rattlesnakes in California Just like go into Los Angeles or something And start like killing everyone And there's one snake at like the very end of the movie That's just like the biggest rattlesnake you can even like Imagine and the guy has to like get on the other side of it in this narrow little like tunnel and like swings or something and that snake had gave me nightmares for a long time and then i got over it and then i read read Stephen king's book

fire starter and they have like mental powers right they can put thoughts into people's minds and the guy gives this like prison guard a snake paranoia. And as I was reading, the prison guard's snake paranoia gave me snake paranoia. I remember that rattlesnake movie. I think it was like an ABC, like Sunday night movie or something. It was like terrible production value, but it was like a lot of good snake scenes. Yeah. Mike, what's your answer?

So I'm going to go with the jungle book. That movie has always kind of unsettled me. but especially the part where Mowgli gets coiled up by, what's the snake's name? Ka. Yeah. And he gets hypnotized and he does like the weird eyeball thing. Yeah. It freaked me out so bad when I was a kid.

Well, and you're afraid of like sexy ladies too, so that's kind of like a double. Completely gynophobia. Yeah. Two-punch combo on you. Exactly. Wait, why is there, there's a sexy lady in there? The snakes, I guess I'm thinking Scarlett Johansson as the snake. Oh, he's talking about the original.

though. Yeah, I'm talking Scarred, yeah. I'm just, I think the voice isn't the original have like a lady

snake deep? No. No. The voice actor for the original cause like my favorite like animated voice

ever. I think that snake is like so well voiced. I love it. I'm picking Beetlejuice when when

Beetlejuice turns into like a snake. It's when Lydia's like running up the stairs and she grabs the banister and it like turns into a snake and then Beetlejuice comes out as like a rattlesnake.

It was the only time in that movie that I felt like Beetlejuice was actually dangerous. And I remember it's scaring me as a kid. And he just looks like a really cool half demon half snake. Oh, man. It's such a good movie. Where do snakes rank for you guys for like scariest types of animals? They're up there. But I like love them so much.

Like I want to go out and look for them. all the time. Well, I do too. Yeah, but they're, they're up there. For me, they're the number one scariest, just the idea of, like, getting bit by one that I don't have eyes on, like, freaks me out. But when I see a snake, yeah, if I, like, stare at them in a zoo or something for too long, I get a freaked out. But, like, when I see him in the wild, like, my first reaction is, like, startled and fear maybe but after like one second i'm like oh that's cool that's that's like such a cool animal and i'm like it's not like i'm like afraid of it when i got eyes on it you know yeah right yeah i like snakes much more much more afraid of like spiders if you want to call it like

irrational i'm definitely team snake i think those are rational yeah like spiders and centipedes scare me more than snakes for sure same what's a fun thing to collect that isn't venomous snakes or dangerous wildcats. It's so funny to me because, like, as a kid, I would collect every bear beanie baby I could find. And it's just, like, I liked them. I thought they were cool, but also it's just like, I, like, I'm setting myself up when I'm an adult.

Like, I'm going to be rich. And then I kind of forgot about them. And then this girl, Mov, shout out Moves, she listened. One day was like, you know, like, beanie babies are kind of worth a lot if you have the right ones and then I went through the whole cycle again where I thought I was rich I'm not I collect a lot of things I think rocks are my favorite collection though just collecting fun rocks yeah Pokemon's a good one Pokemon cards is really the only like collection I ever had pretty a good one I got some chars arts you got like right behind you right now like some comic collection

I guess you could call that a collection Like a book collection I just like collecting books that I've been collecting physical Media lately Pretty impressive video game collection too You have like every type of system With like a lot of games That's half true

I wouldn't I'm not very dedicated to it I just kept all the stuff I had from when I was little Basically but It's never like consciously collecting Okay uh Jeff you said you got an animal fact for us Is that true? Yeah So sun bears are the smallest species of bears

And they have really long tongues True Maybe I think for eating fruit Yeah fruit insects Honey French kissing Because are all common things for sun bears to eat Yeah

I don't even have to look that one up to fact check you You're right about both of those things You know they're not always going to be Facts that people don't already Really challenge us Yeah Yeah. I like it.

All right. We're going to do, what would Mike and Jeff do? You're waiting through some water in the bush in Kruger National Park. And you're bitten by a black mom bagh. Danny. Danny. Yeah. He spelled it D-A-N-I-E, too, which is interesting.

So what I'm doing, I'm not getting out of the water because you want to stay still, right? You just let that river take you down to the nearest hospital. Just float. I like that. Oh, yeah. It's easy. Hopefully you make it without. You got some crock problem.

Crocs. You could Ace Venture the Crocs, maybe, though. Well, I mean, I'm not going to be in the South African bush without, like, a pretty nice knife. I think I'm just chopping my leg off right away. Like instantly. Yeah, as fast as I can. Why don't you just chop it off ahead of time so they can't even bite your leg? That is thinking ahead

All right So we're going to get into what you should actually do Do you know who's going to be real safe From leg bites is The prisoners and face off Yeah The magnet boots They're not going to be able to bite through those things

Right? No probably not Well this guy got bit by the knee though Yeah Never mind I rescind my arm I was thinking And you're going to, like, say, what, like, Oscar?

Oscar. Astorius. Histories. Yeah. That guy is immune. All right. So what you're actually supposed to do, like all of our venomous snakes, this is pretty easy. So if you are bitten by a black mamba, you don't have a lot of time.

So what you're going to want to do is if you have the time to get a quick photo of the snake, that's really helpful so that, you know, you can have positive ID. But the main things you want to worry about, there's two things that you really want. Mike, you remembered it last time. Jeff, do you remember where those two things are that you need when you're bitten by a venomous snake? Cell phone and keys. Yep. You want to call for help and you want to get to the hospital as quickly as possible.

Really, the main thing here is the quicker that you can get the right antivenin for this treatment, the better. The better your chances are surviving, the better your chances of making a full recovery. So really The other things that you want to do Don't like wait for you Professor to finish her lecture No no If you if there's even the smallest chance

You got bit by a black mamba Go get go like go to the hospital Even just wait in the waiting room or something You know but now we know though Yeah right you know Because of him Yeah I could see myself doing that

I could see myself being like I don't think it bit me Let's just see if anything starts Crazy just like how polite. Like, I could see it too, but like, like, you know he felt some symptoms before he told her. And it's just like, you got to, like, just interrupt the class, you know.

Yeah. Yeah. But it's hard. It's hard to make a scene. Yeah. It's an intense snake. It's one you have to be really careful with. So other things that you want to do aside from, like, the hospital and everything,

that's the main thing. But you want to stay calm. You want to do, you want to move as a little bit. little as possible. Wrapping a compression bandage near the wound can really help slow down that lymphatic flow. But really, the number one thing is just getting to the hospital as quickly as possible. That's what you need to do. We talked about this snake a lot, but they are highly defensive snakes.

So I don't want people to continue passing along that myth that this is like a snake that charges out and bites you. That doesn't happen. But if they feel cornered or threatened Not really If there was one It would be the snake probably But it's just that they are highly defensive

They know that they're kind of like A threat So if you get too close to one It might charge out at you But that's it Just trying to create some distance If you back away from it It's going to slither off

It's not going to keep coming towards you So but like Let's say if you were within 10 yards of every snake on earth, this is the one most likely to come and bite. Probably. Would be my guess. Yeah, they have a reputation and they've kind of earned it in a way. But it's still a snake.

It's still like wants to get away from you more than you want to get away from it. So, all right. Our next category, listener questions. Our next category is listener questions. This question is from my friend Kira, who's a wolf biologist and a patron, a close friend of mine. Kira says, my question is related to the chimp crazy episodes. The show was absolutely bonkers and really well done. I listen to the tooth and claw episodes after watching, and I 100% agree with you that owning chimpanzees, monkeys, and slash wild animals, is a terrible idea,

and that dogs fit so well into our families because they've been domesticated for tens of thousands of years and retain wolf juvenile characteristics. and temperaments their whole lives. Yada, yada, yada. She talks about wolves a bit. And she says, but do you think there was a time an early dog domestication where the people with wolves

and early dogs were seen by other people similar to the way that we view people with chimps today? That is, they were crazy, dangerous and it was only going to end poorly for everyone. Cave man, Tom.

How do we think those, yeah, how do we think those conversations went? I thought that's a fun thing to think about. No, yeah. like that question. Yeah. Well, I'm not even sure people today are viewed that way most of the time. I think a lot of the time it's just viewed as like, oh cool, this guy owns a tiger, you know. Yeah, I think you're right. But some of us definitely view him as being like kind of crazy. Yeah. And yeah, there's probably like early man that was like, this dude's going nice.

That's cool, this guy. He's with a wolf. Yeah. Yeah. It would be pretty cool. cool. Yeah. If like your enemy suddenly is that guy's friend. Yeah. Yeah. And then Kira had a second question. She was talking to her sister and they're cracking up at a TikTok trend of the

Hear Me Out cake where people list their hear me outs for people and characters from movies, books that they find attractive. Since so many of them. Been on yours. What's that? Suprana. Oh, Tony. Yeah.

Hear me out. since so many of them end up being animal characters for example Robin Hood made Marion hers is Justin the Rat from Secret of Nim we thought it would be funny for us to do our own version of Hear Me Out with animal characters so who's your hear me out animal character I was going to say

Sodico from the ring but she's not an animal she's kind of cute though you know who Oh, like Samara? The ring girl. Well, I guess either version, Japanese or American, but yeah. I don't think we just hear me out.

I don't think we can count Lola Bunny because she's like universally hot. Oh, man. Well, and it's like, yeah, it's like obviously there's reasons we thought she was hot. Like the camera like slow pans up her. I'll go with Fival's sister. There's something about her that I don't know when I was little. was really crushing on her. From Fival Goes West.

I like that. Man, I'm trying to think. Oh, you know what's the one I would pick is in the goofy movie, the girlfriend. Roxy or Roxanne? Yeah. What's her name? Yeah. Roxanne.

She was hot. Yeah, she was. She's like kind of a dog. You're having a hard time? Paddington's grandma? Sure. That's all you got. Yeah.

You win Perfect answer All right We'll do those for our two patron questions today Jeff, do you got any listener questions from Instagram Sure enough do Show enough do All right

Kate Petard asks Is there a most dangerous national park In the U.S. for animal attacks Yeah, it would be Yellowstone I would say Not one in Alaska No, I mean, I think there's probably Parkland Alaska that like the threat is higher But there's so few people that visit them

And in Yellowstone There's so many people and so much wildlife That I think Yellowstone has to be like the epicenter Especially just for like injuries Like bison get a few people every year Yeah, it's got to be Yellowstone Seth Hall asks He says that he's behind a bit

On episodes and wants to know if we have any, like, episodes in the last few months that we're really happy about. Like bangers in the last few months? I don't know. What do you guys think? Well, Mike did his first ever main. That was kind of fun. Yeah.

Well, and, like, if you want an emotional one, we got a ton of feedback on Wes's just dog episode. Yeah. Yeah. Jeff had a really fun subscriber episode about puffer fish that I really liked. Yeah. Yeah. What else? We just did a bear one on like two bear attacks in Alaska in 1992 that were kind of crazy attacks.

I liked that one quite a bit. Yeah, that's great. Yeah. Bear ones are always good. Lillian Kinn and just all the HBO stuff because you can watch TV too and TV's great. Lily and Kinn asks, what's your favorite opening scene to a movie? To a movie? Yeah.

Man, I would have to think about this a little bit. Let me just look. I'd probably go Fellowship of the Ring. Oh, that's good. Like the kind of the history of everything. Like the narrator, uh, gladryl. Galadry. Yeah.

Galadro. And then just, yeah. Yeah. I have a hard time not picking jaws. Oh, yeah. I think like the attack at the beginning of jaws is like so effective. Naked girl. I got to see some of my first.

of my first boobes ever. Yeah. I always think of the opening credit sequence to Lord of War, my guy, Nick Cage. Fine film. But that, the opening credits is, it's pretty, it's really inventive and ends in a bang, we'll say. Oh, man. There's one big thing to do.

Like opening credits are going and his son just gets snipped in the head. Middle of the day, dude. What the heck? All right. flyered up as what animal has the bushiest tail Hmm Bushiest is like a little bit hard right

Yeah that is a little hard Like lemurs have my bushy tails First thought was like a fox But I don't know if fox is quite bushy I would say they're bushy Coala Squirrels definitely have bushy tails I was thinking squirrel

Like a koala's tail just looks like a bush Like if there's like a cartoon drawing of a bush You could put it on a koala tail They match up exactly Tiny though Yeah but it's like a shrubby little bush Right yeah I think Jeff got that

No You know what's a good answer for that too Is um Like bintarongs Those bear cats that live in Borneo and stuff They have really bushy big tails Oh you know what my answer You know what my answer

Giant An Eaters Bushy old tail? Giant nanny They've got really bushy tails. Super bush. That's for sure my answer. There you go. Lease bushy is like a beaver.

Worm. Yeah. No bush. Not bushy at all. Kimnet Danger says, What do you think caused the lethal bear fight in the catmite at the start of fat bear week? So.

Yeah. Yeah. One of like the people are mad at this bear. because one of their favorite fat bears got totally just... It's not in the rule book. Yeah. I'm glad someone asked that because we've gotten a lot of questions about it. And sometimes bears, when they start fighting, they just get kind of locked in.

They get tunnel vision and they just keep fighting. And my guess is that's what happened here is they probably started fighting over like resources or cub defense or something. and then it just continued and at least one of those bears got really locked in on that fight and then what happened was like the bear ended up like drowning the other one like it pushed in underwater and it couldn't get up

and it drowned it and killed it. It is crazy but it kind of in a way this is going to sound a little harsh in a way I'm kind of glad this happened at Fat Bear Week because I think the anthropomorphizing of Fat Bear Week specifically had gotten to a level like we weren't treating them like bears

Yeah, where they're being treated like cartoon characters and this showed people like, these are bears. These are animals that have natural behaviors and that are cute and fun and stuff. But they can be really dangerous still and they can be really kind of like metal. You don't think he's trying to win fat bear week, right? I don't think that was the case. Yeah. No, no. Well, I remember we did a, we did a patron episode.

on Fat Bear Week, like two years ago maybe, or maybe last year. I think he was last year. On that, like, waterfall where they fish for salmon, there's a few spots that are just, like, money spots, too, where, like, you can just get, like, tons of salmon compared to every other spot. So they do get really territorial during that. Yeah. And the thing, like, we've talked about this a bit, but, like, there is.

a really good food resource there that supports a lot of bears. And even though there's better spots than others, like they'll fight over those. They don't like fully generally fight to the point where they're trying to run the other one off. But like in Yellowstone, if there's like a dead elk carcass and it's just enough food for one bear,

they will make sure that other bear's gone. Like they will run it off. They will do whatever they can to protect that food resource. And I think we're just kind of seeing that to a degree there. And then it just progressed to a level where one of the bears died. And that's nature. Like, that stuff happens. And it's kind of cool that it happened right before a fat bear week.

I mean, if a bear ate that bear, it double in size probably win the whole thing. I don't think that's how it works. But, yeah. Are we good? We're good. We're going to do a quick conservation corner. So this snake, as I mentioned earlier, it's very widespread. It's abundant.

It's IUCN. least concerns. So there are a lot of them. They are often killed by people that are afraid of them or that want nothing to do with them. These are snakes that are really good at controlling rodent populations. They're really good at just doing what they do. So if you see a snake in the wild, respect that this is an animal that's evolved to a certain niche. I don't know why I said niche. niche and like they are they belong on this planet we don't kill animals just because they scare us like we shouldn't do that that's disrespectful to an animal that's earned its its place so um and having visited africa twice this year i just want to like give the whole continent credit because

i feel like europe america we just killed so many of our animals before we started like really putting effort into conservation. And they just have a ton of animals there. So good job, like, keeping a lot of your animals. Yeah. And then, uh, finally, let's do our claw ratings for black mamba. I was thinking to real quick for like, if it's just like a cage match of snakes, where do you think black mamba would end up?

Pretty high. But there are, there are snakes out there that, like, kill venomous snakes. So I don't know Like boas and pythons might They don't generally kill venomous snakes But like king snakes can kill rattlesnakes and stuff I don't know Yeah that's a good question

Yeah All right let's do our claw rating for black mambos Seven big ones Seven big old claws These snakes I like all snakes Pretty much equally I don't really differentiate

Or prefer one over another If I saw one Or if I studied one I'm sure That's interesting sting take. What? All snakes the same?

Yeah, all snakes are cool. But yeah, I don't feel... Like if you were to write out your top 10, do you think Black Mamba would be in it? Probably not. But I don't think about snakes quite the way you guys do. It's not like something I've considered as thoroughly, you know. But they're great. I like them.

Yeah, I would, I think I'd give them a 9 and they're close to a 10 for me. I think this snake would be like on the short list for a snake that I would get a tattoo of. I think they're really cool looking snake. They look like really scary to me. Where would you get it? On my arm. Yeah. And then I could tap it with my wand when I want to summon the dark lord. So cool. But like they're not like spectacled cobras I like more. There's a rattlesnakes I like more. There's a fair amount of snakes that I like more than black mamba's. But I really, really like them. So I'm going to give them a nine. Yeah, I want to go higher than this, but I think I'm going to go seven as well as Mike.

Like, they're actually not even my favorite mamba and my second favorite mamba. Like, I love green mambas or Jackson Mambas is the other name. I just think they're like one of the, I'm really into green snakes, I've realized. Like green tree pythons, my favorite. I love green boas. I like the green mambas. Yeah. I think, I think, James.

Jameson's Mamba was the snake you were looking for. Yeah. Not Jackson's. And they're different than green Mamas. Oh, yeah, Jameson's. Okay. But it is a Mamba. It is a Mamba.

Yeah, and they are green, but they're not green Mamas. I like those. Yeah. So, yeah. I mean, Black Mamba would probably be, like, around, like, I don't know, 14 or so for favorite snakes. And probably you got to rank it, like, 172 for overall animals. All right. Well, thanks guys for listening.

This was a really fun episode for me to put together. I feel like I learned a lot about an animal that I've always been really fascinated by. And I think it's really cool that there's an animal out there that is like deadly. That deadly to that level. I think a lot of these snakes and spiders and stuff, when we really break it down, we learn that they're not really as deadly as we always think they are. and with Black Mamas, they really live up to their reputation. I think that's really cool.

Yeah, me too. All right. Well, we love you guys. Love you guys. Mike? Bring it in for a hug. See ya. Bye.