A new sheriff has slithered into town. Earlier this week came the exciting news that researchers in the Amazon Rainforest have discovered a new species of snake which is also the world’s largest. The discovery was made in Ecuador and like the previously believed world’s largest snake, it’s a giant green anaconda – though it split from its closest relatives 10 million years ago.
It was previously believed that there was only one species of green anaconda found in the wild, known as the Eunectes Murinus. But the discovery of the “northern green anaconda”, belonging to a separate species called Eunectes Akiyama, has changed that.
Although the green anaconda snakes look almost identical, there is a genetic difference of 5.5%. This might not sound like much, but is a very considerable divergence – humans, for example, are only 2% different from chimpanzees. The split between the two species of green anaconda can be traced back some 10 million years ago.
In remarkable footage shared online, the scale of the 20-foot-long (6.1-meter-long) giant becomes clear. It is seen underwater, with one of the researchers who discovered them, a Dutch biologist called Freek Vonk, swimming alongside the snake, weighing in at around 441 pounds (200kg).
At first, the researchers were not planning to make any new discoveries. Anacondas are very good indicators of the ecological health of an area. The researchers were studying the potential impact on human, animal and environmental health from oil spills that have occurred in the region.
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Indeed, some of the snakes they studied were heavily polluted. Both anacondas and arapaima fish were found to be accumulating a large amount of the petrochemical metals. Immediate effects mean that the fish would need to be avoided by pregnant women, for example, due to the raised levels of methylmercury.
“What we were there to do was use the anacondas as an indicator species for what kind of damage is being done by the oil spills that are plaguing the Yasuni in Ecuador, because the oil extraction is absolutely out of control,” researcher Bryan G. Fry explained.
“But the really amazing part was, despite this genetic difference, and despite their long period of divergence, the two animals are completely identical,” he continued.
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