The Snake That Can Kill An Elephant

A king cobra can drop an Asian elephant in under three hours.

It rarely does — elephants are not on the menu, and the snake gains nothing from the fight. But when one is cornered, usually near a wild boar or jungle trail it considers its own, the king cobra rears up to nearly two metres of its own body length, lifts a head the size of a man's hand, and looks the elephant in the eye. Then it bites — almost always on the trunk tip or near a toenail, the only places thin enough for the fangs to deliver venom into the bloodstream.

One bite contains enough neurotoxin to kill twenty adult humans. In an elephant, paralysis spreads through the trunk, the breathing slows, and the animal collapses. There are field reports going back to the British Raj of mahouts watching it happen and being unable to do anything.

The venom itself is not the most potent in the snake world. Several sea snakes are far deadlier drop for drop. The king cobra wins on volume. A single bite injects up to seven millilitres — about a teaspoon and a half — straight in.

What makes the king cobra strangely unlike other snakes is its intelligence. It's the only snake on Earth known to build a nest for its eggs, weaving leaves into a low mound with its body and guarding it for weeks. It recognises individual handlers. It hunts almost exclusively other snakes, including pythons longer than itself.

Villagers in parts of Kerala and Karnataka still leave offerings of milk and eggs at forest edges where one has been seen — not out of worship exactly, but out of the practical understanding that the animal is watching them back.