More on Aussie Serpent

Posted by: Loren Coleman on March 13th, 2007

Australian Taipan

An illustration of a central ranges taipan.

Original news of find reported here on Cryptomundo.

New deadly species found

A NEW species of the world’s most venomous snake, the taipan, has been discovered.

The central ranges taipan was found in the central desert of Western Australia but its habitat could extend into the Northern Territory and South Australia.

Dr Mark Hutchinson, from the SA Museum, caught the snake crossing a dirt track on a sunny afternoon during a survey of the Ngaanyatjarra lands late last year. The find was announced yesterday. Laboratory analysis at the WA Museum, and DNA testing at the SA Museum, confirmed it was a new species.

Professor Steve Donnellan, who conducted the DNA tests, says this find has real significance.

“Its DNA profile is very distinctive, compared with the other taipans and the brown snakes,” he said.

“The last big new snake discovery in Australia was probably in the early ’80s, one in northern Australia and one in the southwest. And the last new taipan was discovered 125 years ago.” Professor Richard Shine is a leading Australian biologist and an expert on the evolution and ecology of Australian snakes.

“My initial reaction is that this is really exciting,” he said. “Taipans are such an icon of Australia.

“To discover that there’s an entirely new taipan, more than a hundred years after the last one, really gives us an idea of what might be out there.”

There are two other species of the snake, the inland taipan, and the common taipan, of which there are two sub species, mainland coastal and Papuan.

Professor Shine says it is still very common for people to be finding new species. “It does seem remarkable that such large animals of general interest are quite poorly known,” he said.

“Maybe that reflects how few people are interested in going out to catch large snakes on hot days.”Clare Peddie
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Loren Coleman About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct). Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015. Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.


15 Responses to “More on Aussie Serpent”

  1. springheeledjack responds:

    Go Taipan!!!

    That’s what I am a talkin’ about when I say keeping an open mind…for those who scoff and say that well, we’re populated all over the planet, and that there are no unknown places left to explore…there you go (and yes, I have heard that argument many a time on the crypto front).

  2. springheeledjack responds:

    Since no one else is either up or in…perhaps I will debate with myself for a while…:)

    –Yes, but that is a mere meter long snake in Australia. That has absolutely no bearing on things such as Bigfoot. The U.S. is much more densely populated, and even more people than ever before camping, hiking and tromping through the countryside. A 7-8 foot hairy biped could never hide from us.

    –JackHeeledSpring

  3. springheeledjack responds:

    Not so JHS…

    While I will grant you there are several hundred million people in the U.S. (I don’t have the exact figures and I don’t feel like stay up late enough to gather them), there is plenty of country where there are no people. There are parts of Kentucky that no one has ever set foot in yet…same with the back areas down south, and let’s not forget the great NorthWest…and don’t even get me started on Canada!

    However, JHS, you are missing the real point to this: there are still creatures all around that have not been accounted for yet…granted, percentage wise, most of them are going to be small in size, but that does not mean that bigger things are not out there.

    –SpringHeeledJack

  4. springheeledjack responds:

    SHJ,

    I appreciate your reasoning, but it is still invalid. For what you are proposing in the case of bigfoot, you are talking about a surviving population of large humanoids that are moving about undetected in a world with technology (cameras, camera phones, etc.) at their disposal and they are not coming back with any concrete evidence.

    I will grant you that there is a lot of uninhabited lands in the NorthWest, but there are plenty of people traveling through those areas all the time, and to suggest that a viable population of such size could avoid detection to this extent in the 21st century…well the percentages are not in your favor my friend…

    –JackHeeledSpring

  5. springheeledjack responds:

    JHS,

    That is exactly what the theory is. How do I explain it? I do not know at present. I have not seen the BF’s personally (and I hesitate to refer to them solely as animals because if correct, they may be of a higher order of intelligence than mere animals), and I do not know what they are capable of cognitively or behaviorally.

    When we make contact definitively, we will know.

    The point is, there are still species of animals out there that have only recently been discovered, and if there is one possibility, there are more. And just because, according to probabilities, it is not likely, it does not mean it cannot happen.

    Alright, giant squids. We know they are there, and how many times have we actually seen, captured or photo-ed one in the last hundred years? Sure we have plenty of eye witness accounts over the centuries (uh-oh, it’s that buzzword we love to argue about…no not centuries, eye-witness-accounts…), but how often do we actually encounter them?

    Exactly.

    –SpringHeeledJAck

  6. springheeledjack responds:

    SHJ,

    You are shying away from the topic at hand. I’m not talking about giant squids at the bottom of the ocean that have thousands of square miles to hide in where men cannot explore.

    I’m talking about a stretch of forest that is supposed to house a living population of creatures (I will not step on your toes by referring to the BF as animals just to avoid another argument) larger than the human race.

    There is a HUGE difference there. And the fact is, that there is no viable evidence to support such claims.

    –JackHeeled Spring

  7. springheeledjack responds:

    JHS,

    1) It depends on what you call evidence.

    2) It is the same realm. Oceans versus forests. People…oh and let’s not talk men here…there are plenty of women involved in this too, but I will be gracious and forgive your male-o-centrism this time…

    I digress, people do not spend as much time in the forest environments as it is often thought. At any given point in time, even with all of the campers, hikers, and what-have-ya, there is still plenty of thousands of square miles where no one is present.

    There are vast areas on land and in the seas where larger creatures may still live without us being aware. Human beings are not omnixcient by any means…and most people are not even that observant in their own environments…don’t believe me…watch your fellow humans for a while.

    –SpringHeeledJack

  8. springheeledjack responds:

    SHJ,

    And you, sir, are guilty of the same old circular arguments without ever coming up with any tangible proof. Show me a bigfoot, and I will even apologize.

    Until then, you haven’t proven anything…

    –JackHeeledSpring

  9. springheeledjack responds:

    JHS,

    And you have done the time honored maneuver of copping out and saying “Show me the critter or I will hold my breath and not believe you.”

    It’s a classic dodge when you have no more ideas to argue over.

    I’m not asking you to believe…just asking you to keep an open mind…toy with the idea that it is possible…maybe not probable, but possible…

    If you can do that, then we are on the same side.

    …Okay I am tired of this now…someone else can entertain…

    You get my point though don’t you? Even if it is in a squirrely and round about way???

  10. kittenz responds:

    LOL Springheeljack,

    You pretty much have it covered! There are 300 million-plus people in the USA, but there are many thousands of square miles of uninhabited or sparsely inhabited wilderness, and much of it is contiguous with even more wilderness area in Canada. A great deal of that wilderness area has been only superficially explored, so it would be possible for a breeding population of large animals to exist there.

  11. kittenz responds:

    BTW SHJ,

    We also want to remember that in the US, there are vast swampy forested areas in the lower south that are also largely uninhabited.

  12. YourPTR! responds:

    Australia is probably the best continent IMO for finding previously unknown animals. An area approximately the size of the lower 48 United States contains only 20 million inhabitants and over 90% of those are huddled along the coast! It also has a rich history of Bigfoot reports and sightings too and the animal has a remarkable resemblance to its North American counterpart! 🙂

  13. mystery_man responds:

    Springheeledjack, that was pretty funny. 🙂 It reminds me of arguments I basically have with myself. I am always playing devil’s advocate with my own ideas, and I am fairly certain that for every post I make here that I really believe, I could write another one effectively countering it. Interesting that it became a debate about Bigfoot! 🙂 What about the taipan?

  14. MBFH responds:

    springheeledjack becomes Jekyll and Hyde – a veritable Victorian nightmare! Good reading though, thanks.

  15. springheeledjack responds:

    kittenz–yeah, you are more correct…I didn’t have the facts on areas and what not, and didn’t want to get attacked for throwing out the wrong numbers…thanks! That’s what I think too.

    yourPTR!–I believe you are right too…plenty of area…isn’t there tell of some possible giant lizards…15-20 long or more supposedly rambling the uninhabited areas there? Saw something on the Discovery Channel some time back, but I forget their name…and what did you think of the sea serpent photo…taken by a frenchman, I believe, supposedly offshore (I think it was Australia maybe back in the 80’s???) under the water in the shallows…was reported as a highly possible fake/hoax, but never heard too much about it after the fact.

    Mystery_Man–me too…that is what bothers me so much about the debunkers—they just ASSume that people such as we just accept every sighting, encounter and photo as proof and that we do not spend as much time weeding out the fakes as the debunkers…in reality I would wager we spend more time testing for hoaxes because our credibility is so much more in question by those other people…oh, and the taipan…sorry got off on a tangent as I am often want to do:)…the latest find is just one more example of realizing that there is more out there in the world than what we can read in the latest zoology book or see in our own backyard…the world is still a very big place!

    MBFH–didn’t want to leave you out…was really just thinking out loud and trying to put myself in the place of the non-believer/debunker/etc…again, maybe it’s more a matter of semantics, but I don’t think this has ever been a contest of believers versus the non-believers…it has always been about getting to the truth…and there are those who want to find the truth, and those who want to ignore possibilities and the reality that there is something going on in the great forests, large lakes and the oceans…and doubtless a few other frontiers I am not privy to.

    In the end, if you don’t want to accept the possibility, fine don’t, but the rest of us are going to keep on this until we get some real answers…personally I have never found nay-saying too much fun as a hobbie…plenty of other options out there to keep my attention…like hunting for crypto-critters…

    Thanks and good night!

    Spring Heeled Jack (and that other guy)

Sorry. Comments have been closed.

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