Original subtitles

All right, guys.

So right now we're on location in Darwin, Australia,

and we're trying to make a video for the "Brave

Wilderness" adventure kit.

This is the reptiles and amphibians edition.

And our goal is to get a frilled dragon to sit on top of it

and flare out its frill.

There's a big one on the back side of this tree.

And with any luck, I'm going to be able to catch

it and place it on top.

I'm going to try to do this in a single take.

Here we go.

Now, Mario over here is scouting for me.

Now, the strategy here is all about sneaking

up to the trunk of the tree.

I'll look to Mario.

He'll give me the signal as to how high it is.

And then I jump, swing my arm around the side,

and make the catch.

Got it.

Whoa!

Look at that.

That is a big boy.

That is a big dragon!

Look at the size of that lizard.

One of the most iconic reptiles here in all of Australia,

the frilled dragon.

I see you, buddy.

We've got our lizard, and now it's time to get

the epic shot of this-- oh!

Dragon up on top of the "Brave Wilderness" adventure kit.

Woo!

How about that for a catch, huh?

That is a good-looking dragon.

OK.

So, let's crouch down for a second.

I'm trying not to get whipped in the face by that tail or bitten.

They have really, really, really sharp teeth.

And I was bitten the other day.

It was not fun.

What I'm going to do, Mario, is actually

pass the dragon off to you.

Yeah.

Let's see if we can get it properly

wrangled on top of the box.

I think maybe that-- see that little pocket right there?

Sure.

Right there?

Let's come right up to that.

Did you get the catch?

Oh, yeah.

This is awesome.

Got it.

Whoa!

This lizard is the only kind that has a frill like this.

This species is the only one that has a frill.

They are incredibly prehistoric-looking.

And you can see that frill is a big defense,

basically puffing up saying, OK, you don't want to mess with me.

All right.

I think this spot right here is probably pretty good.

Set the kit down.

Let's see.

So, I'm going to hand the lizard off to you.

Be very, very careful, very careful.

You do not want to get bitten by this lizard.

There we go. You got him?

Yep.

And you see on my hand there actually was already

bitten the other day by one.

Trust me, it's not fun.

I want to try to get blue sky, if possible.

I can lighten up the foreground, no problem.

Oh, this'll look sweet.

If we can get him on top of right there,

I can get those blue clouds in the background.

Hold on.

I've got to move this stick.

OK.

Man, this is one of the most challenging parts-- getting

the lizard to actually balance.

Oh, that's-- I'm just going to snap these pictures.

You're going to have to stand perfectly still.

Yeah, we cannot move.

I'm in-- I got a great frame.

I'm good.

Ready?

Yup.

That's it.

That's the shot right there.

Oh, my gosh.

This is the coolest shot we could ever get for the "Brave

Wilderness" adventure kit.

This is perfect.

I'm going to try one in portrait mode.

Got it.

And that is the frilled dragon.

Good snag.

All right!

Wow.

That's a big one.

Good job, guys.

Well, that's the shot.

That's all we needed, a beautiful photograph

of a frilled dragon on top of the "Brave

Wilderness" adventure kit reptiles and amphibians edition.

The last thing to do is let the lizard back up

onto the same tree where we caught it

and maybe get a cool GoPro shot of it going away.

What do you think? Sounds good.

All right.

Let's walk back over to its tree.

A great day out here in the park picking up B-roll shots

and finally catching one of these big

dragons to get on top of the "Brave

Wilderness" adventure kit.

I'm Coyote Peterson.

Be brave.

Stay wild.

We'll see you on the next location.

All right, ready? Yup.

Let's try to get a cool shot of him going up the tree.

So I'm going to let him kind of grip on.

And you good?

Yep.

One, two, three.

Sweet. - Dude.

Ripped the camera and everything.

That was awesome.

- All right. - Yeah.

- This one's mine. - Mario.

This is mine.

No!

I want it!

Give me that adventure kit!

If you thought an adult frilled dragon was cool,

look at the hatchling.

Oh, my goodness!

I didn't know that you guys found a hatchling.

They were hanging on in this tree

right underneath our nose, as they say.

That is so cute!

You know what's better than a baby frilled dragon?

What?

Oh.

Two baby frilled dragons.

Two baby frilled dragons.

Check that out.

Oh, my gosh.

They're so cute!

Oh, man.

It's climbing right on my finger.

Twinsies.

So Mario, why are we finding babies right now?

It's hatching season.

Yeah.

So, at this point, they're hanging out in these smaller

trees, and they like the vegetation that's a little

thinner since they're smaller.

They hang out on the stems and the branches.

Are these babies at threat from the adults?

Like would an adult frilled dragon eat the babies?

An adult will eat one of these.

However, look at that camouflage.

We were actually standing underneath this tree

for several minutes.

And basically, I just saw a little bit of movement.

I was like, oh, what's that?

And it was a little frilly.

On our days off, guys, we

are always constantly working.

And the fact that there are frilled dragons in this park

gives us the perfect opportunity to get some of that really good

cryptic B-roll that we're always after and, of course,

the opportunity to pick up a few extra photographs

for the memory collection.

There you go.

Look at that little guy.

So little.

Today is the ultimate snake

venom milking comparison, the moment we have been waiting for.

Comparing the king of snakes, the king cobra,

the largest elapid in the world, to the largest viper

in the world, the gaboon viper.

Both of these snakes are considered

deadly, neither of which I have ever worked with before.

But today, Carl and Mara are going to show us exactly what

it takes to milk these snakes.

I'm intimidated, guys, and I haven't even

seen the snakes yet.

Where do you want to start?

Cobra or gaboon viper?

Yeah.

So what's that old saying? "Go big or go home."

Let's start with the king.

I think that's a good place.

This is a young king.

She's a female.

She's about 4 and 1/2 years old.

She's only about 10.5 feet.

Hold on a second.

"Only about 10.5 feet"?

For a king cobra, that's not big, right?

So, in fact, king cobras are dimorphic by size.

So males get much larger than females.

OK.

So a male king cobra is 16 feet.

But a female king cobra, typically

not more than about 11 or so.

Now, if it does jump off the table, where do I go?

Because we're in a very tight quarter room.

Anywhere that the king is not.

- Anywhere that the king is not? - Yeah.

OK.

OK, guys.

Here we go.

This is going to get exciting.

I didn't even know it was right there.

Oh!

Look at that.

Wow, that is a big snake.

So there she is.

You can hear her starting to move just a little bit of air.

- Whoa! - Good.

And hissing.

And hissing.

And now she's basically saying, stay away from me, you know?

And she's trying to gauge what's happening right now.

So we're going to move her here in just a second.

That's a dangerous little

jack-in-the-box right there.

It's just like, oh, cobra pops out right in your face.

You bet.

I don't want to distract Carl.

I know I keep talking, but he has to stay so

incredibly focused right now.

OK.

I'm behind you to take the snake.

I think this is just a good opportunity for a second

to give you a sense how remarkably shy

even the most dangerous snakes in the world are.

Yes.

So you can see she doesn't want anything to do with us.

She's thinking, leave me alone.

I was in a dark, quiet space.

Why are you agitating me?

And I think this is a great sense of,

I don't want any part of you.

You just let me be.

Unfortunately, we have an agreement here,

and she's got to come out and pay the rent.

So, we're going to catch her.

The speed.

It's unbelievable how fast the snake

comes in and out of that box.

I'm going to get Carl just a little bit more space here.

Oh, big snake.

Hold on a second.

See, here she is.

Good.

Come on in.

- I'm coming on over. - Come on in.

Good.

And full pressure applied.

OK. Good.

Come this way. Come this way.

Look at the size of the snake.

Twice the size of the table.

It's grabbing onto the camera. OK.

Hold on one second.

Hold on one second and let her go.

I'm letting go.

It's the king's show right now.

Don't worry about the camera.

You're OK.

Got it.

Mara, are you still here?

Yup.

Hold on one second.

Good.

I've got full pressure on her.

Move her back.

Whoa!

Look at the speed!

Carl is faster than the cobra.

Wow.

Mara, now what do you need me to do?

So this hand here.

Oh, my gosh.

This snake is so big.

And you can already feel that vent open,

so you're going to want to hold it shut so you

just keep yourself clean. - Right here?

Yep.

And you might have to fold your--

Wow!

That is me holding a king cobra.

My goodness.

This snake is so big around, I can't even get

my hand all the way around it.

Beautiful, huh?

That is crazy.

How intimidating is it to hold the head like that?

So, you know, I always think

you're paying close attention anytime you're working

with big elapids, right? Yeah.

So we'll allow her to bite two or three times,

see what we can get.

King cobras, of course, are ophiophages.

They're snake eaters almost exclusively.

And although here in captivity, our group

are readily feeding them rats.

OK. - OK.

Are you ready for a bite?

I think so.

Are you guys ready to see the bite happen?

I'm ready to go. All right.

Let's see how much venom this snake is going to give us.

So we'll see.

Like I said, we'll have her bite multiple times and that's it.

Oh, my goodness!

And king cobra venom, you can see

that deep, beautiful yellow.

And so as you can see, as she's chewing,

she's injecting a little more venom each time.

And we're probably looking at, oh, gosh, 300 or 400

milligrams of dry weight here.

When we think about 20 milligrams of king

cobra venom is a lethal dose.

So, in the case of 400 milligrams there,

you're looking at an awful lot of lethal doses, right?

We'll see if she can do it one more time for me.

She's done.

No, there she goes one more.

And she's done. Wow.

Excellent.

All good?

Thanks.

Everybody's good? All right.

Back into her cage.

That right there kills a lot of people.

Now, if you guys thought the power and the size of the king

cobra was intimidating, wait until you see the gaboon viper.

This is the world's largest viper,

and they have fangs that can be as long as 2 inches in length.

I mean, we're talking that, if snake bites you,

it's fangs are going right through your hand.

That's going to be a little more calm,

I'm guessing, than what the cobra situation was.

But snakes should fill up a good portion of the table.

Oh, my goodness.

Look at this snake.

Wow!

Beautiful!

Look at the horns on the front of that snake's nose.

That is an intimidating snake right there.

Now, Carl, what is the strike distance for a viper like this?

Like, am I in the danger zone right

here or not likely to launch of the table?

So you're just outside. No.

OK.

You would be amazed at how fast a gaboon

viper can go from here to here.

Yeah.

You can't believe it.

In the event somebody comes across the snake

and they don't get close to him, he'll remain motionless.

He'll sit there and blend in.

But if you step on a snake like that, of course,

then things happen very fast.

How dangerous is the venom of this snake?

I mean, we're about to get that venom,

but if you were to be bitten, what are you looking at if you

get, you know, tagged on the foot or your hand,

how much time do you got?

Big gaboon viper bite in the wrong place

or particularly if it hit a vein could

really be problematic quickly.

So anyway, that's kind of a-- that little puff you just saw,

that was just a little bit, OK, hey, what's going on here?

I'm starting to get a little agitated.

We're going to try to avoid that.

OK, great. - All right.

So we're going to switch him around.

I'm going to have Mara change places with you.

OK.

And we're going to switch him around and we'll catch him.

All right.

And then once, Mara, you've got the body under control,

that's where I can come in and hold on to the back side

of the snake? Yeah.

OK.

Oh, listen to that hiss.

OK, there's no pressure yet.

Perfect.

Don't change anything. Got him?

Yeah.

Good.

Ho-ho-ho!

Gaboon viper.

This is cool.

I'm not going to talk much.

I got to let Carl keep his focus.

I got a good hold on the snake's body.

Oh, my goodness!

Get out of here.

And you get a sense of that big bite.

Let's see if we can get it to penetrate one more time.

And--

Wow!

Just wow!

Look at that!

And these snakes will bite and hold on, right?

They will, exactly, Coyote. Good.

- You've got it? - I've got her.

- OK. - And I'm going back.

OK. Excellent.

That was probably

the most intimidating snake I have

ever been a part of milking.

That was awesome, Carl.

You feel good about how that all just went down?

Yeah, I thought so, right?

So you got a sense of that, really, they're just placid

right up until the last minute.

And then that bite is dramatic and rapid, right?

And she gave us a pretty good yield today.

That's probably 500 milligrams of venom.

And we think on gaboon vipers, probably about 100 milligrams

or so is probably a lethal dose.

OK.

So that right there could probably kill about five people.

We think so. OK.

Now, the power in that bite, you could

see the whole vial shaking around as her fangs

were just pow, pow, pow, pow!

That's just it.

I always think so.

You imagine that on a barefoot, you know, or you imagine

that on a hand, you're reaching down into a bush or something

like that, and all of a sudden, you've got

this massive head locked on.

And so, you know, a gaboon viper bite, no joke.

Phew!

Well, that was without question intimidating.

Now we have milked the king cobra.

We have milked the gaboon viper.

And the next step in this experiment

is to actually take a look at both

of these venoms mixed with, of course, human blood, my blood.

So this next part is going to get really interesting.

I'm really curious to see what the difference

will be between elapid venom and viper venom mixed in with blood.

Yeah, I think we should see some things

under the microscope. Hoping so.

OK.

Well, let's head over to the lab and see what we see.

Sounds great.

Sitting before me here is one very toxic science experiment.

We have pulled blood from my body.

And here in these two vials, we have the cobra venom

and the gaboon viper venom.

To start, we perform a rudimentary test with three

petri dishes of my blood.

The control has no venom, while the other two are each

given a small sample of the respective venoms,

clearly labeled king cobra and gaboon viper.

After sitting for several minutes,

we visually noticed coagulation near the drops of venom,

and a lower blood viscosity near the outer edges of the dish.

However, to really see the cellular destruction your body

would be facing if you were bitten by one of these snakes,

we need to turn to the microscope.

You have, in advance, prepared the blood slide.

Now what we're going to do is add venom to each one of these.

Right. OK.

Should we start with the king cobra?

Yeah, let's do it.

OK.

We're going to add just 2 microliters of venom

to the blood here.

And that's basically just a very small drop.

This is exciting.

King cobra venom entering into the blood

underneath the microscope.

Oh.

Whoa!

Whoa!

Whoa.

Whoa.

The blood cells are going crazy!

And that's pretty much instant.

And actually, the venom is so thick,

it's pulling the blood out from underneath the slide.

So it's not diffusing in, it's pulling the blood out.

It's sucking the blood out from underneath the slide.

This is insanity!

Look at-- the blood cells are going berserk.

Look what it's doing.

It's actually pulling in the venom here.

So you can see that yellow venom on the edge and all this blood

is pulling out of it.

It's created like a current.

Wow!

And so each one of these moving cells

is just going to explode, essentially,

in that little tiny drop of venom.

It is like the red blood cells are getting magnetized

in towards the venom.

And I wonder if that has something to do with the thicker

viscosity of the venom.

This is beyond what I was expecting to see.

King cobra venom contains neurotoxins that immediately

begin to attack the victim's central nervous system, which

can lead to paralysis and, eventually,

cardiovascular collapse.

It also consists of cytotoxins which cause cell lysis.

This physical breakdown of the red blood cells

is what you are witnessing visually,

and the accompanying pain is unbearable.

Without the administration of antivenom,

a king cobra bite is a guaranteed death sentence.

This was a shot I really wanted to see.

This is like a--

I didn't know if we could get it but--

- zombie massacre right here.

So that dark red swatch that we see there

in the middle of the screen, that's all the blood

cells being lysed out?

Yeah, that's all the remains of your former blood

cells, yeah.

So, it's kind of like if they were to go through

like a mincing machine that's just chopping them apart

and then into a wasteland.

At a cellular level, yeah.

All right.

Now that we have seen the destructive nature of the king

cobra venom, it is time to take a look

at the gaboon viper's venom.

Remember, this is a hemotoxic venom

that's just going to destroy blood cells left and right.

Ooh!

This is going to be wicked.

Oh!

Wowzers!

So it's just instant.

Instantaneous.

Just two seconds.

Look at that destruction.

Look at the speed.

It is like a rushing waterfall of red blood cells

going through a paper shredder that are

just destroying these cells.

Yeah.

Gaboon vipers are armed with the largest

fangs of any snake.

And with just a single bite, they can inject a fatal yield

of hemotoxic venom.

What you are seeing visually is the immediate destruction

of red blood cells and the inability for the cells

to clot, which eventually leads to

massive internal hemorrhaging.

A bite from the gaboon will bring about a slow

and very painful death.

I keep this in mind.

When a snake is out there hunting

and it bites a prey item, it needs its venom

to work quickly so that the prey is immobilized

and it has its meal.

This is proof that that venom works

incredibly fast to essentially kill something.

Hunter, thank you so much for giving

us this up-close look at the venom under the microscope.

Today's experiment was beyond my expectations.

So cool. Thank you.

I'm Coyote Peterson.

Be brave.

Stay wild.

We'll see you on the next adventure.