a rare little tyke - Bitis atropos

Now this little rascal you wont find just anywhere. The irascible Berg Adder

Limited to wet cool mountains in the of Southern Africa its a rare opportunity to see one. But best leave it at seeing them.

In the exuberance of youth I took some home and decided to tame them... Bad Choice... the books mean it when they use the words "highly irascible" and "never tamed". But kids being kids I decided to try.

That is where I learned first hand that snake handlers are the ones most likely to be bitten by their captives. I also got to experience first hand the effects of a very unique neurotoxin.

This little adders venom is not life threatening but knocks out the facial nerves in humans.

By JonRichfield , CC BY-SA 3.0, Link

I lost my sense of smell, taste, eyelids were paralised, my eyes could not adjust to light, and I could not squint inwards... each eyeball stared straight ahead resulting in a blurred triple vision.

Each sense took time to return, from days, to weeks, to months and even today my sense of smell is weak and my eyes are sensitive to bright light.