Essay by Eric Worrall
Sell your automobile or the snakes will get you?
Venomous snakes likely to migrate en masse amid global heating, says study
Researchers find many countries unprepared for influx of new species and will be vulnerable to bites
Neelima Vallangi Fri 3 May 2024 19.35 AEST
Climate breakdown is likely to lead to the large-scale migration of venomous snake species into new regions and unprepared countries, according to a study.
The researchers forecast that Nepal, Niger, Namibia, China, and Myanmar will gain the most venomous snake species from neighbouring countries under a heating climate.
Low-income countries in south and south-east Asia, as well as parts of Africa, will be highly vulnerable to increased numbers of snake bites, according to the findings published in the journal Lancet Planetary Health.
The study modelled the geographical distribution of 209 venomous snake species that are known to cause medical emergencies in humans to understand where different snake species might find favourable climatic conditions by 2070.
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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/may/03/venomous-snakes-migrate-global-heating-study
The abstract of the study;
Climate change-related distributional range shifts of venomous snakes: a predictive modelling study of effects on public health and biodiversity
- Prof Pablo Ariel Martinez, PhD
- Irene Barbosa da Fonseca Teixeira, MSc
- Tuany Siqueira-Silva
- Franciely Fernanda Barbosa da Silva, BSc
- Luiz Antônio Gonzaga Lima
- Jonatas Chaves-Silveira
- Prof Miguel Ångel Olalla-Tárraga, PhD
- Prof José María Gutiérrez, PhD
- Talita Ferreira Amado, PhD
Summary
Background
Climate change is expected to have profound effects on the distribution of venomous snake species, including reductions in biodiversity and changes in patterns of envenomation of humans and domestic animals. We estimated the effect of future climate change on the distribution of venomous snake species and potential knock-on effects on biodiversity and public health.
Methods
We built species distribution models based on the geographical distribution of 209 medically relevant venomous snake species (WHO categories 1 and 2) and present climatic variables, and used these models to project the potential distribution of species in 2070. We incorporated different future climatic scenarios into the model, which we used to estimate the loss and gain of areas potentially suitable for each species. We also assessed which countries were likely to gain new species in the future as a result of species crossing national borders. We integrated the species distribution models with different socioeconomic scenarios to estimate which countries would become more vulnerable to snakebites in 2070.
Findings
Our results suggest that substantial losses of potentially suitable areas for the survival of most venomous snake species will occur by 2070. However, some species of high risk to public health could gain climatically suitable areas for habitation. Countries such as Niger, Namibia, China, Nepal, and Myanmar could potentially gain several venomous snake species from neighbouring countries. Furthermore, the combination of an increase in climatically suitable areas and socioeconomic factors (including low-income and high rural populations) means that southeast Asia and Africa (and countries including Uganda, Kenya, Bangladesh, India, and Thailand in particular) could have increased vulnerability to snakebites in the future, with potential effects on public human and veterinary health.
Interpretation
Loss of venomous snake biodiversity in low-income countries will affect ecosystem functioning and result in the loss of valuable genetic resources. Additionally, climate change will create new challenges to public health in several low-income countries, particularly in southeast Asia and Africa. The international community needs to increase its efforts to counter the effects of climate change in the coming decades.
Funding
German Research Foundation, Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico, Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior, German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research, Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación de España, European Regional Development Fund.
Read more: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanplh/article/PIIS2542-5196(24)00005-6/fulltext
Models all the way down.
In venomous snake filled Australia, we’ve developed a very simple solution to the snake threat: Buy a cat.
Greens complain about house cats decimating the local wildlife, and this complaint is largely true.
But one of the forms of wildlife cats are really keen on killing is venomous snakes. They like the taste. So most of us tolerate the occasional endangered bird being dragged through the cat door, in return for almost total protection from animals which could kill us or our kids.
Did I mention cats are really popular in my part of Australia? My cat got plenty of treats and fuss a few years ago when it saved me from a snake.
The snake unexpectedly fell off the rafters of an outdoor patio area onto my table, landing just behind my laptop.
The snake didn’t hang about, it was much too worried about getting away from the cat. Though to be fair it probably climbed into the rafters in the first place because my cat was stalking it. The snake got away on that occasion, though the snake was badly wounded – the cat clawed and bit it, but the snake managed to slip through a crack in a fence where the cat couldn’t follow.
Of course, encounters between snakes and cats are less common in an urban environment, my snake encounter occurred when I was living on an acreage property. Snakes aren’t the smartest animals, but they know what cats smell like, and usually stay well away from anywhere heavily frequented by their ancient enemy.
I’m not sure how popular house cats are in the nations named in the study, but I bet they will become a lot more popular if a venomous snake threat emerges, whatever the cause.
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All you need to know
Indeed:
This really does not amount to a “study”, it is an exercise in speculative modeling. Such an exercise might result in the generation of a hypothesis that could be tested, but it certainly does not result in any “findings” or “conclusions”. Asserting that the outcomes of speculative modeling are findings of any sort should be considered scientific malpractice.
Worse than that the model chosen to give the scary result was RCP8.5. The same one the IPCC themselves say is highly unlikely.
Despite the IPCC saying RCP8.5 is highly unlikely Pielke and Ritchie noted that according to Google Scholar between the start of 2020 and mid June 2021 over 8500 papers using the implausible baseline scenarios had been published. Almost 7200 used RCP8.5 and nearly 1500 used SSP5-8.5.
Many climate ‘scientists’ seem to have no idea of integrity.
Pielke & Ritchie ‘How Climate Scientists Lost Touch With Reality’ (Summer 2021)
Wasn’t there at one time a movie about a similar claim of impending doom from nature? . . . I think it was called something like “Sharknado“,
& we had ‘Snakes on a plane’
And The Day After Tomorrow
2012
(OH! Wait. That’s old “news”.)
I haven’t watched any of those movies.
Just a total lack of interest in fake fear…
What?!? You don’t follow Sharknado Week?
Just what was that movie about?
And killer bees, and quicksand, and acid rain….
I’ve heard the same scares my entire life. Meanwhile every country is cracking down on free speech, and in the US the cities are becoming a wasteland of drugs and crime that isn’t punished. They don’t really care about what they proclaim to care about, at all.
What about all the venomous spiders, flesh-eating bugs & the poisonous plants ???
If you look at the Mortality Statistics at the US CDC, the deaths from opiates started AFTER the Harrison Act was passed in 1914 to make it illegal.
The first deaths reported from opium and its derivatives was in 1921.
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/vsushistorical/mortstatsh_1921.pdf (search for opium)
Both opiates and alcohol act the same way by increasing the amount of dopamine released. The alcohol bars were losing customers to the opium dens. It lasted longer and didn’t lead to drunkenness and hangovers. Both were addictive to people whose ancestors came from opiate-producing and consuming regions and whose bodies didn’t produce enough endogenous morphine(endorphins).
ok, not sure what the point is…
The anti-drug laws, the war on drugs, the multi-billion $ per year funding, greatly enlarge the police and prison states, markedly benefit the drug cartels (and the politicians who do their bidding), lead directly to a great deal of major crime which hardly existed previously, greatly increased medical costs to the general population, and have not decreased drug use in the slightest.
Agree wholeheartedly.
See also: Operation Gladio.
Seems to me that heat is supposed to spread northward…poleward…from more equatorial regions. Seeing as South and Southeast Asia have nothing southward but ocean, how.exactly will a pole ward shift of habitat increase the likelihood of snake bite from invasive species in 2070? Will Sea Snakes suddenly migrate to land and move inland?
Likewise Niger is mostly Sahara Desert country but CO2 induced Oasification of the southern areas could see migration of snakes from Nigeria or Benin into the newly greening territory
who knows what lies beneath the surface waters?
The venom will become more deadly too….get a mongoose for protection.
And they will grow 3 sizes that day. Oh wait I confused deadly snakes with the Christmas Grinch.
The way I heard it mongoosen (or whatever the heck the plural of mongoose is) will in fact eat snakes. But they prefer just about anything else. Native mammals, birds, whatever. So, have a snake problem? introduce mongooses. Now you have two problems.
not unlike more cats
First I heard that cat and snakes don’t mix.
Like Oil and Water…just add egg and they make a wonderful soufflette
You can mix basically anything using a blender. !
Some things still need an emulsifier to remain blended though
My cat put on a performance just like the video, but the snake got lucky. He really enjoyed attacking the snake, and did a good job of making it feel unwelcome. I’ve never seen a snake move so fast trying to get away.
snakes do get the odd cat but cats are more likely to survive a bite than dogs are;-(
My Dad had a hunting Cocker Spaniel that hated rattlesnakes. We lived in the North Carolina mountains at the time, and every spring the Cocker would get bitten and swell up like a balloon. Over the summer it would get bitten several times again with little effect. Guess it had developed an immunity from that first bite. But, next year, the same thing would happen again. This went on for several years, until we finally moved back to the flat lands.
I wonder how these snakes are going to migrate, on a plane maybe? 🙂
just about everything else seems to benefit from air travel, so why not?
well since we banned decent fumigation of incoming OS freight we now have fireants and varroa mites and a few others in aus, so os travel by our snakes is possible too I guess.
Saw an article a few years back where Hawaii was now getting infested with your Brown Tree Snake. They assumed it had hitched ride and flown in from Australia rather than one of the other islands.
Climate Breakdown? How does a climate breakdown anyway. WTF does that even mean? This is getting absurd how words are twisted to scare people but have no actual meaning in any scientific sense.
Climate Breakdown day being the moving target of End Times. On that single day, when everything ends, every bad thing they predicted from deadly snake migration to ingrown toenail and everything in between, which is just about anything bad, will strike like a meteor from outer space and all the bicarbonate in all the world won’t prevent you from dying of fright.
Ironically we have a much greater chance of civilization being wiped out from a meteor than “Man Made Global Warm…aahhh we really meant climate change all along!” and all the Governments in all the world can’t do anything about meteors either.
However, an argument can be made that the Trillions we spend on AGW would certainly be better spent on the greater threat of meteors than climate which is going to change, for better or worse, no matter how much authority we give the bureaucrats to restrict our freedoms. They now want to muck about with aluminum particle shields in space that won’t stop a meteor but just might block enough solar radiation to plummet us into the next ICE AGE. SMF’s.
World Ends at 10…Film at 11
Lack of CO2 is the biggest threat facing land plants and animals. If the CO2 drops below 150 ppm the land plants die and the land animals die with them. In the last glacial period, the CO2 level hit 180 ppm.
https://pioga.org/just-the-facts-more-co2-is-good-less-is-bad/
The interglacial periods, like the Earth is currently in, usually last about 10,000 years and it has been about 12,000 years since the last glacial period so the next glacial period could start at any time.
It will start at any time if these morons with the “Gentleman C” degrees who vacation in Davos, listen to the pseudo-intellectuals from the Ivy league, and keep mucking about with our atmosphere. Bring on the CO2 I say.
I saw the phrase “Climate Breakdown” and immediately thought of Bluegrass Music.
Speaking of which, the aptly named “Carbon County Breakdown”
I’m counting on the coming explosion in feral cats to deal with them.
The headline and the actual study results are not the same thing.
From the article:
So contrary to the headlines, most venomous snakes will lose territory, not gain … while only a few will gain or move territory. And not due to climate, but due to habitat loss.
Are they sure snakes aren’t more like pigeons?
Let’s see. A scary Guardian climate article about modeled venomous snake migration alarm, published in Lancet, funded by Germany and EU.
That all makes sense—except for the part about the snakes.
“Snakes” are only there to Make you Afraid…Very Afraid
Automobiles kill many more people than snakes.
Are you sure about that? Snakes love hot asphalt on sunny days and it is not uncommon to see dead ones. I think automobiles kill more snakes than people.
But, don’t you remember, autos were in the crosshairs first?
Build The Snake Wall!
Hell yes the democrats will register them to vote if we don’t. Green cards? They don’t need no steen-keen green cards.
Cool – there area only a few Timber Rattlesnakes in New Hampshire, we could use some more. (I think we have three “Rattlesnake Mountains,” that may date back to warmer climes.)
Rattlesnake Mountain in Eastern Washington supposedly the tallest treeless mountain in the 48 states has a few snakes on it too…….
We have rattlesnakes in the Uplands of Wisconsin. They tend to concentrate on the rocky bluffs along the Wisconsin River. Even tho my dairy farm is only a few miles farther south, in over 40 years have never seen one on the farm. Despite covering every inch several times a year gathering firewood, early fall grouse hunting, spring morel mushroom hunting.
So you have morels too.
One of my hunting buddies is really good at spotting them and I need him to show me how. He has sold some on the internet from his property and I’m sure my oak woods has plenty since I get morel poachers trespassing.
There was a local morel story a year ago and the state Health Department
got involved FYI========>
https://dphhs.mt.gov/publichealth/cdepi/diseases/MorelMushrooms
Locally after a forest fire the mushroom pickers come here from all over the
country, bushels of morels harvested, some large camps setup ect..be careful…
“BuzzWorms” aka Diamond Backs. I remember bucking hay bales as a young teenager
and being taught to roll the bale towards yourself when you pick it up,
so if there was snake under the bale it would move away not towards you. I also noted
that those on ranch/farms which had a lot of snakes seemed to have a good sized
arrowhead collections. Something about keeping your eyes on the ground a lot when
out working. I had a buddy who caught and collected them and kept them in a large glass jar and
collected the venom for sale…..he made some decent money on the side. He preferred the
young ones for some reason, more potent than the older ones. I have quite a few memories
of my youth and snakes..
The Guardian is the go-to place for my daily hit of lunacy.
Question – wouldn’t all species of reptiles have migrated to new territories as the last ice age receded?
So snake migration as a result of warming environments would not be a new phenomenon on this planet?
Otherwise, my advice for potentially affected countries would be to stock up on mongoose.
Cats are pussies.
Always liked pussies,
… never liked cats.
Nice to know that we care for snakes, not only for polar bears and wolves.
Maybe we should export some of the Eastern Browns, and maybe a few Taipans, to wherever these high falutin PhD professors live so they can study them live rather than just in GIGO models.
There is an Australian Snake Wrangler on American TV. That may not be the exact title, but it is interesting and of course they show off their multitude of talents. I grew up on a farm with western diamondback rattlesnakes where despite many encounters I never quite stepped on one. I probably wouldn’t be writing this except none even struck. They save venom where it is used best! Do all the parrots in Australia give snakes any trouble?
That makes sense, saw one there and got a lousy picture, but impressive bill. Never did see a snake but may have been due to winter, Snowy Mountains great with ‘roo’ tracks.
I do my snake wrangling with a long spade…
A .410 is the best farm tool for dealing with brownies Eric.
A .22 caliber, or even a strong .177 caliber pellet pistol would be more sporting. Also consider that rats and mice are favorite foods of snakes, so they do come with a significant benefit.
My view of cats just went up a bunch, are many cats killed by snakes? As for this study it is trash and whoever paid for it should be fired.
Cats are smart and faster than snakes, so most of the time the cat wins. I’m sure occasionally a snake gets lucky.
If you have snakes about that are feeding on a rodent population just feed the rodents with paracetamol snake eats rodent good buy snake. Toxicity to mammals is very low not so much snakes
Don’t let your dog get the paracetamol, nor the cat, they can’t process it and it kills them through liver failure. Not nice.
Riki Tiki Tava
Why did it have to be snakes?
Why only venomous snakes?
They sound scarier?
What will the harmless snakes be doing?
Some one in this motley crew, (Willis? Kip?) opined that the worth of a study was inversely proportional to the number of authors. I count nine, it should only take one, even then it would still be worthless. Publish or perish.
I think that chickens are more likely to kill snakes than the other way round and will attack any incautious snake. Presumably because snakes will eggs and chicks given half a chance.
Clutching at serpents, seems like a reach.
Hey, snake charmers need academic promotions and tenure too. Let them all climb aboard the climate crusades chasing the money.
If they used the word “migrate” then they’re beyond full of shit.
The bigger worry is if all the people in Darwin suddenly decide to move to Adelaide. That would be a disaster of epic proportions. The McDee’s mess alone could make the Great Barrier Reef catch fire!
Rikki Tikki Tavi…
Kipling’s mongoose.
Get several and have Mongeese
When I was 14, my parents sent me to pick tobacco for income in school holidays, 5 weeks in Dec-Jan in the these hot tropics at Ayr, Queensland. The farm had trench irrigation, creating a haven for frogs. A gathering of frogs means mealtime for snakes. We’d meet several a day.Older pickers would wrap dead browns around unpicked bushes, so we’d end up with a handful.
The authors of this article fail to note the association between snake migration and the tobacco industry.
It is just as plausible as global warming causing migration. Or the hydrocarbon industry acting like tobacco people, so they must be snakes.
Geoff S
Much of the planet’s population needs to plan to move the Mars because climate change will force polar bears to migrate further south until they take over the suburbs. Meanwhile as more venomous snakes infiltrate urban areas, these will also become uninhabitable. And as temperatures rise into the bargain, agricultural failure and widespread famine are almost guaranteed, so what’s the point of staying here, anyway?
sound like a rarely discussed part of the plan
“climate change will force polar bears to migrate further south”
Wait there…. are you saying the polar bears will move south to escape the Arctic warming?
There is something there that is a bit puzzling.. please explain ! 😉
I think I have figured it out.
Because “the Arctic is warming twice as fast as everywhere else”…
…. eventually it will be warmer than the Tropics.
Is that right ??
You should be able to handle the coming snake apocalypse Eric…. 😀
(yes I’m that old….)
Eric,
My early years at Mackay introduced me to the family of Ram Chandra, one of the pioneers of milking snakes to make anti-venoms. His daughter or niece Naomi Ramsami was in my school class. Memory lane stuff, you handsome photographic lad. Geoff S
The researchers forecast that Nepal, Niger, Namibia, China, and Myanmar will gain the most venomous snake species from neighbouring countries under a heating climate.
So, I guess the only snakes Americans need to worry about are the ones tattooed on the gang members migrating north.
How on earth could snakes know where it’s going to be colder?. Oh, stupid me, they don’t need to wait for Darwinian evolution to drive the process, they can just use their smartphones to google it.
Ive had 3 near misses from browns really close calls around hay bales of course. I got another one by the tail with a linetrimmer(accident) but the shovel was handy luckily. 2 tigers one nearly got a dog and the big brown I didnt see cost me 4+k to save the dog who also didnt see it in time.
joys of rural aus.
I saw that Grauniad article last Friday and immediately thought to myself “RCP 8.5 ?”.
So, purely out of curiosity (and boredom) I downloaded the paper and had a look.
“Hang on a second”, my increasingly unreliable memory informed me, “didn’t the IPCC say that RCPs and SSPs don’t mix ???”.
Opening my “AR6-WGI_Titles-and-extracts.txt” file confirmed that the IPCC did indeed say that, in section 1.6.1.1, “Shared Socio-economic Pathways”, on page 231 :
So, the
palpeer-reviewers of the Martinez et al paper failed to spot that this paper’s “projections for 2070” used non-IPCC-standard scenarii.Also from the IPCC’s WG-I assessment report, in section 1.6.1.4, “The likelihood of reference scenarios, scenario uncertainty and storylines”, on page 239 (just 8 pages later) :
Anyone who has done even minimal checking of the various families of IPCC “emissions pathways” knows that the “old / CMIP5 for AR5” RCP8.5 pathway is neatly bracketed by the “new / CMIP6 for AR6” SSP3-7.0 and SSP5-8.5 pathways.
This means that for the IPCC, if SSP3-7.0 is above the “counterfactual” threshold then so is RCP8.5.
_ _ _ _ _ _
There are four figures in the Martinez et al paper.
An extract from the caption underneath Figure 1 :
Figure 2 :
Figure 3 :
Figure 4 :
In addition to the
palpeer-reviewers of this paper not knowing that the IPCC’s RCP and SSP “scenarios” are not directly comparable, they also failed to spot that the paper concentrates almost exclusively on the “counterfactual” option, i.e. it is “pure climate porn”.Urban researcher fantasizing another climate delusion.
Snakes love warmth.
Snakes love sunlight.
Snakes are reptiles and very warm reptiles are much faster and agile when warm.
People raising reptiles at home put artificial heaters into their cages and terrariums.
That is, the snakes ain’t going to migrate away from warmth.
It does sound like researchers took one of their personal fears, e.g., snakes, and modeled self satisfaction scenarios where they personally are very afraid.
Ask the researchers for proof of poisonous snake migration from warmer to cooler habitat.