Another oh.. so rare - Bitis heraldica
The Angolan adder.
This tyke is so rare,(just like the plain mountain adder) and to compound the difficulty it is found in a country known for its forgotten war - Angola
A place that had an ongoing civil war for over 26 years. One of the final stages of the Cold War, what the rebel forces would have liked to have turned into Cuba's Vietnam.
Large game was decimated, millions of landmines were planted and much of the country has been a no go zone for decades.
These photos are likely the first and only pictures of a live specimen of this species publicly available.
They were posted to a South African forum in 2011
Probably less than 20 specimens are known to science and very little about its venom and behavior.
Quite a stunning species....
Supposedly, if the photographer had known what he was photographing he would have taken more photos than just these two, or is that just the myth that is growing up around this species?
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