Poisonous animals

Poisonous animals produce toxins for two purposes: for protection and for attack. For some, poisonous secretions are a means of scaring away predators and protecting their lives, for others - a hunting tool for food production.

Poisonous animals are distributed unevenly among the diversity of fauna. If the venomous arthropods (scorpions, spiders, some insects) are known widely, then there are only four species of such mammals. These are the Australian platypus and echidna, as well as the American pipe-toothed and some shrews. Interestingly, the pipe-tooth, possessing poisonous saliva, is susceptible to its own poison! In fights that occur between representatives of the species, the pipe-toothed die even from small bites of their opponents. How, in this case, they manage to maintain the population size at a sufficient level, and in general, why does the animal produce poison, from which it dies itself - one of the mysteries of biology.

Many poisonous animals in the minds of ignorant people are demonized. They are credited with a mortal danger to a person, which in reality rarely corresponds to reality. The poison of most scorpions causes a person only local defeat, which after several hours safely passes. Only one case of the death of a person (a seven-year-old boy) from a bite of a giant scolopendra was reliably recorded . The bite was in my head, most likely, at the same time, vital centers were hit, besides, medical help was late. Otherwise, this episode could be excluded from the list of lethal statistics.

Widely spread in Russia, an ordinary viper is dangerous only in the spring, when it actively produces enzymes. And this reptile for the restoration of poison requires much more time than its southern counterparts. Therefore, our viper spends toxins very economically, preferring an attack to flight, and a person bites only in the order of self-defense. In summer and autumn, the poison of a viper does not represent a mortal danger and can cause only a series of unpleasant sensations. Poisonous animals are not very abundant on the territory of our country. Only the southern regions can "boast" a variety of toxic fauna.

Many of the world's poisonous animals have so-called "passive toxicity". This means that they do not have special organs that produce poison. Such, for example, is a fugu fish containing tetrodotoxin in tissues, even in small quantities, which is deadly to humans. Toxicity to fugu is so high that it is cooked by specially certified culinary specialists. In Japan, despite such precautions, several deaths occur every year due to the consumption of this fish.

Poisonous plants and animals for the most part - representatives of warm and hot regions. This selectivity of nature is due to the fact that at a high temperature the rate of metabolism of living organisms is much higher than at a low temperature, and the inhabitants of the tropics can rather afford the luxury of producing poison than residents of temperate and cold latitudes.