{"id":2861,"date":"2025-06-17T14:02:02","date_gmt":"2025-06-17T14:02:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bangbizarre.com\/index.php\/2025\/06\/17\/rare-venomous-snake-spotted-in-dartmoor\/"},"modified":"2025-06-17T14:02:05","modified_gmt":"2025-06-17T14:02:05","slug":"rare-venomous-snake-spotted-in-dartmoor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bangbizarre.com\/index.php\/2025\/06\/17\/rare-venomous-snake-spotted-in-dartmoor\/","title":{"rendered":"Rare venomous snake spotted in Dartmoor"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><b>2025-06-17 14:02:02<\/b><br \/>\n<BR>A rare black adder \u2013 one of the UK\u2019s only venomous snakes \u2013 was spotted in Dartmoor on Friday 13.<BR><br \/>\nWildlife enthusiast Max Piper was stunned when he came across the melanistic adder, a jet-black version of Britain\u2019s most feared reptile, while walking the moors.<BR><br \/>\nThe sleek beast was coiled up on the grass and Max managed to capture a photo of it before it slithered away.<BR><br \/>\nSharing his encounter on his Facebook in the Dartmoor Public Group, he wrote: &#8220;A surreal moment to stumble upon a gorgeous melanistic (black) adder this afternoon. <BR><br \/>\n&#8220;These are rare, and this is only the second one I&#8217;ve ever seen, but most people have probably not encountered an adder of this colour shade before&#8230; so I am lucky to have now seen two up to this date.&#8221;<BR><br \/>\nThe large snake quickly became a viral sensation, with social media users both mesmerised and horrified.<BR><br \/>\nOne said: \u201cI didn\u2019t realise you can get snakes here that big. Beautiful \u2013 but not something I want to meet on a walk.\u201d<BR><br \/>\nAnother added: \u201cSaw one on the coast path at Mortehoe a few years ago \u2013 not as big as this though.\u201d<BR><br \/>\nOthers were simply in awe: \u201cHow beautiful is that!\u201d, \u201cAwesome!\u201d, and \u201cWhat an incredible find \u2013 stunning!\u201d<BR><br \/>\nWhile adders are usually grey or brown with a zig-zag pattern, melanistic ones are completely black \u2013 making them ultra-rare and harder to spot in the wild.<BR><br \/>\nBut experts warn that although the snakes are shy and don\u2019t seek confrontation, they can bite if startled \u2013 and it can be serious.<BR><br \/>\nA spokesperson from the Amphibian and Reptile Conservation said: \u201cThe adder is Britain\u2019s only venomous snake. While the likelihood of being bitten is very small, it does happen.<BR><br \/>\n\u201cAdder bites are potentially serious \u2013 especially for children and pets \u2013 but effective treatment is available.\u201d<BR><br \/>\nThe snake \u2013 often wrongly feared \u2013 is a protected species under UK law, and is usually seen between March and October.<BR><br \/>\nExperts say if you spot one, keep dogs on leads and give the reptile plenty of space.<BR><br \/>\nAs one commenter put it: \u201cThese poor little animals are timid and vulnerable. They don\u2019t want to hurt anyone \u2013 they just want to be left alone, comfy in their little happenstance.\u201d<br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/bangbizarre.com\/\" target=\"_blank\"> Visit Bang Bizarre (main website) <\/a><br \/>\n<br \/><script src=\"https:\/\/geo.dailymotion.com\/player\/xtbac.js\" data-video=\"\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>2025-06-17 14:02:02 A rare black adder \u2013 one of the UK\u2019s only venomous snakes \u2013 was spotted in Dartmoor on Friday 13. Wildlife enthusiast Max Piper was stunned when he&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2862,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2861","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bizarre"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bangbizarre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2861","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bangbizarre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bangbizarre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bangbizarre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bangbizarre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2861"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/bangbizarre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2861\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2863,"href":"https:\/\/bangbizarre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2861\/revisions\/2863"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bangbizarre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2862"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bangbizarre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2861"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bangbizarre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2861"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bangbizarre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2861"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}