– World’s Most Dangerous Animals –
The number of humans animals kills each year is sometimes surprising. The deadliest creatures are often much smaller and more likely to kill through disease rather than razor-sharp teeth. These creatures come in all shapes and sizes.
Animals are all around us. Because of their close proximity, many people take it for granted.
How truly dangerous some of the animals that are right within our communities can be.
Who knew something as small as a mosquito could wipe out a group of adults?
The World’s Most Dangerous Animals
If you want to know what features make the animal so dangerous: Is it a venomous poison? A sharp sting? Or piercing fangs?
Here are the 18 World’s Most Dangerous Animals on the planet that will give answers to your question.
1. Lions
Lions are one of the most dangerous animals on the planet. They are particularly aggressive and dangerous to humans when protecting the cubs, territory, or carcasses that they have hunted.
Lions are responsible for about 200 human deaths per year, which puts them in the top 10 most deadly wild animals.
Lions typically become man-eaters for the same reasons as tigers: starvation, old age, and illness, though as with tigers, some man-eaters were reportedly in perfect health.
Man-eating lions studies indicate that African lions eat humans as a supplement to other food, not as a last resort.
2. Sharks
A Great white shark, carcharias, jumped out of the water. Great whites are the world’s largest predatory fish.
While sharks are commonly portrayed in movies and television shows as deadly killers, the reality is much different.
Worldwide, sharks account for only several hundred attacks on humans, and they only average six to seven human deaths per year
In the United States, sharks cause about one death every two years. The species responsible for the highest percentages of fatal attacks are the great white shark, the bull shark, and the tiger shark.
3. Pufferfish
Pufferfish, also known as blowfish, is located in tropical seas around the globe.
Though they’re the second most poisonous vertebrate on the planet (after the golden arrow dart frog).
They’re arguably more dangerous as their neurotoxin (called tetrodotoxin) is found in the fish’s skin, muscle tissue, liver, kidneys, and gonads. All of which must be avoided when preparing the creature for human consumption.
Indeed, while wild encounters are certainly dangerous, the risk of death from a pufferfish increases when eating it in countries like Japan.
Even then, accidental deaths from ingestion occur several times each year. The tetrodotoxin is up to 1,200 times more poisonous than that cyanide.
And can cause deadening of the tongue and lips, dizziness, vomiting, arrhythmia, difficulty breathing, muscle paralysis, and if left untreated, death.
4. Elephants
Elephants are the world’s largest land animal, with male African elephants reaching 3m tall and weighing between 4,000 -7,500kg.
Normally we think of elephants as smart, friendly creatures, and they have been a staple of circus performances for many years.
The reason they perform so well is because of their intelligence and their complex emotions and social structures.
More Information
But their status as the largest land animal means that they have an immense amount of weight and the associated power that comes along with it.
Elephants in captivity are capable of anger and retaliation, and those in the wild can be territorial and protective of their family members.
An average of 500 people per year are killed during encounters with elephants by being trampled, thrown, crushed, and other similarly unpleasant means.
5. The Brazilian Wandering Spider
Many spiders have fangs packed full of toxins but aren’t known to bite people. Unfortunately, the Brazilian wandering spider is not one of these.
Even worse, this spider often lives up to its name and wanders into densely populated areas to seek shelter in dark.
Also in cozy places like the inside of shoes, clothes, log piles, cars, and other places people may stick their hands.
Human death can occur within two to six hours of a bite, typically as a result of lung failure through fever, vomiting, and also occur.
Bites from Brazilian wandering spiders are uncommon, but don’t let your guard down in their territory.
6. Hippopotamuses
An aggressive hippo male (Hippopotamus amphibius) attacked the car of tourists. Huge hippo males intimidate their opponent with mock charges.
Hippos have even been known to attack boats for encroaching upon their habitat, and they can use their sharp teeth that grow up to 20 inches long very effectively.
They attack by biting, trampling, and will hold their adversary underwater until they drown. “World’s Most Dangerous Animals”
READ ALSO
7. Box Jellyfish
Box jellyfish is one of the World’s Most Dangerous Animals often found floating or very slowly moving at speeds close to five miles per hour in waters.
These transparent, nearly invisible invertebrates are considered by the Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to be the most venomous marine animal in the world.
Those tendrils are lined with thousands of stinging cells known as nematocysts, which contain toxins that simultaneously attack the heart, nervous system, and skin cells.
While antivenoms do exist, the venom is so potent that many human victims have been known to go into shock and drown or die of heart failure before reaching shore.
8. The Scorpion
Scorpion stings are painful but rarely life-threatening. Young children and older adults are most at risk of serious complications.
In the United States, the bark scorpion, found mainly in the desert Southwest, is the only scorpion species with venom potent enough to cause severe symptoms.
Worldwide, only about 30 of the estimated 1,500 species of scorpions produce venom toxic enough to be fatal.
But with more than a million scorpion stings taking place each year, deaths from these stings are a significant public health problem in areas where access to medical care is limited.
Healthy adults usually don’t need treatment for scorpion stings. But a scorpion sting can have serious effects on young children.
9. Tsetse Flies
Tsetse flies are found in Africa, living in damp areas along the banks of rivers and lakes. They are the size of a large housefly and feed only on blood.
As is the case for the bugs to come, it is not the actual bite of the tsetse fly that kills humans but the resulting infection that proves fatal.
The tsetse fly resides in the tropical regions of Africa, and their bite infects the host with a parasite that causes African sleeping sickness.
African sleeping sickness is a very difficult disease to treat especially given the lack of medical resources in the area, but without treatment, the disease is fatal without exception.
10. Golden Poison Dart Frog
Poison darts are a large, diverse group of brightly colored frogs, of which only a handful of species are particularly dangerous to humans.
Its poison is called , is so potent that there’s enough in one frog to kill ten grown men.
Just with only two micrograms roughly the amount that would fit onto the head of a pin but is able to kill a single individual.
Its poison glands are located beneath its skin, which means a mere touch will cause trouble
Deforestation has landed the frog on several endangered lists, but if you’re lucky enough for a rare sighting when hiking, don’t go reaching for it.
11. The Kissing Bugs
Assassin bugs or “kissing bugs” get their names from their habit of biting humans on the face near the lips while they sleep.
Assassin bug is the collective name used to refer to over 150 species of insects that possess a specific type of curved .
This proboscis is used as a tool, for defense, and also to hunt, and the propensity of these species to target the soft tissue regions around the mouths of humans is what earned them their more commonly known name of kissing bug.
12. Crocodiles
Crocodiles have been around since the age of the dinosaurs. The next apex predator entry on our list of the deadliest animals in the world is the crocodile.
Responsible for somewhere between 1,000-5,000 deaths annually, the crocodile is one of the largest, most aggressive, and most dangerous animals in the world.
Weighing in at over 2,000 pounds, crocodiles possess immense bite strength and can travel at speeds up to 25 mph.
More Information!!
Crocodiles are the sole entry on this list that actively hunt and prey upon humans.
The deadliest species is the Nile crocodile which lives in the regions surrounding the Nile river.
And they were so feared by ancient Egyptians that they carried tokens of their crocodile god for protection from the reptiles.
13. The Freshwater Snails
Aquatic snails have two tentacles and land snails have four, with the eyes located at their tips (land snails) or at their base (aquatic snails).
Snails depend on their senses of smell and touch and on organs to navigate their world.
This snail doesn’t directly kill humans but the disease that they transmit.
14. Dogs/Wolves
A wolf snarling over its prey to protect it from competitors. Wolves are legendary because of their spine-tingling howl, which they use to communicate.
Man’s best friend is also one of our deadliest threats. Directly fatal dog and wolf encounters are exceedingly rare in comparison to the number of deaths resulting from canine transmitted rabies infections.
Rabies transmission from wolf species is much lower than those from dogs, but they are not zero. “World’s Most Dangerous Animals”
15. Cone Snail
They are found in the warm waters in the tropics, these beautiful creatures are instantly recognizable for their highly prized brown and white marbled shells.
They can be seen in shallow depths closer to shore, near coral reefs and rock formations, and beneath sandy shoals.
But do not dare to touch the four- to six-inch-long gastropods: Their concealed, harpoon-like “teeth” contain a complex venom known as a conotoxin, making them one of the most venomous species of snails
Only a handful of people have ever been stung, but, quite unfortunately, there is no antivenom. “World’s Most Dangerous Animals”
The toxin stops nerve cells from communicating with one another; so the creature not only causes paralysis within moments.
16. Snakes
The Indian cobra(Spectacled cobra, Naja naja, Bangalore, Karnataka) is one of the big four venomous species that inflict the most snakebites on humans in India.
It turns out that the fear of snakes or may not be so unreasonable after all.
While many people fear large snakes like boa constrictors and anacondas.
More Information!!
The snake responsible for the most deaths is actually the saw-scaled viper which only measures up to three feet long!
Also called the carpet viper, this snake resides in Africa, the Middle East, and India, and the females of the species are more than twice as venomous as the males.
Aside from the high death rate, the carpet viper’s venom is a neurotoxin that causes an extremely high number of amputations in those victims that it doesn’t kill outright.
17. Mosquitoes
The mosquito is the single deadliest animal in the world and also one of the smallest. Mosquitoes are estimated to cause between 750,000 and one million human deaths per year.
They are a vector for many diseases that are deadly to mankind including malaria, dengue fever, and the West Nile and .
Malaria alone accounts for over half a million fatal infections annually. Only the female mosquito feeds on humans with the male feeding on nectar.
18. Humans (Homicides Only)
Surprised? After all, we’re animals too, and since we’ve been killing each other for 10,000 years, the total deaths from war alone are estimated at between 150 million and 1 billion.
We assault each other with incredibly high rates of senseless brutality, from gun violence to terrorist attacks around the globe.
We’re dangerous to other animals, too! Think global warming, the destruction of forests and coral reefs, and over-tourism, for starters.
What’s More!!
Given the threat, we pose to countless other creatures and the fact that we often act irrationally.
And have the capacity to our entire planet with a host of horrifying weapons like nuclear devices.
And genetically-modified superbugs are square atop the list as the most dangerous animal in the world.
We believe the article World’s Most Dangerous Animals was interesting and helpful, please kindly share with friends and also hit the subscribe button to get updated on new articles.
StudentsandScholarship Team.
Be the first to comment