Kramer's Pit Viper

Fascinating facts about the Kramer's Pit Viper

• When the monsoon ends in September and October, male and female Kramer's pit vipers perform a dramatic tree-climbing courtship, with the female literally pulling the male upward before they mate.
• The snake’s name, macrops, isn’t just fancy Latin, it points to its unusually large eyes, a trait that stands out even among other green pit vipers.
• You can find this green viper threading through the forests of northern Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and southern Vietnam, with its scientific description anchored to Bangkok, Thailand.
• Like its Asian cousins, Kramer's pit viper carries hemotoxic venom that can break down blood cells and disrupt clotting, a reminder of why the Viperidae family tops the list of snake-related human fatalities worldwide.
• A 1977 paper by Eugen Kramer is listed in the further reading for this species.

About the Kramer's Pit Viper

The Kramer's pit viper, Trimeresurus macrops, is a green arboreal snake whose most arresting feature is its disproportionately large eyes, a trait that inspired its specific epithet, macrops. Like its close relatives, T. macrops possesses hemotoxic venom that can disrupt blood clotting and damage organ function. During the tail end of the rainy season, between September and October, females pull males upward in the trees to initiate mating.

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