Most lethal scorpions of them all?

Hey all!

A question to people that knows: What are the 10 most lethal (as in most toxic, not most casualties) scorpions of them all?

And please NO GUESSING, do a minimum of research first

As far as I can tell number 1 is Hottentotta Tamulus? Is this correct?

yeah i thought it was Hottentotta Tamulus . unless anyone know different

I always heard L. quin was the worst drop-for-drop.

Heard that aswell, but also heard they do stings with low-quantity of venom in so it almost never comes to anything seriouse...

I also heard they're not that aggressive, which is why A. australis is always getting the credit for lethality. I read a book about medically significant scorpions, and while it was written quite some time ago, it said that australis is the most toxic Andro. I know it causes the most casualties, but I'm sure it ranks near the top on the list of toxicity too.

the top 2 is L.Q and tityus trinitatus
the top to you have to give me a few but i know that

Leiurus quinquestriatus
Leiurus jordanensis
Tityus trinitatus
Androctonus austrailis
Apistobuthus pterygocercus
Tityus serrulatus
Tityus bahiensis
Parabuthus transvaalicus
Buthus occitanicus
Centruroides noxius


im pretty sure those are the ones that are most dangerous

Thanks for the list TELOW! Just what I was looking for! How many of those would be lethal to a healthy grown human?

No hottentotta tamulus? I read on several different places that these were the most toxic scorpions in the world? Any comment on that?

Btw found LD50 table here:

http://members.tripod.com/c_kianwee/rpotent.htm

This indicate the potency of the venom as this:

1 ) Odontobuthus doriae (0.19mg/kg) (surprise!!!)
2 ) Leiurus quinquestriatus (deathstalker) (0.25mg/kg)
3 ) Androctonus mauretanicus (0.31mg/kg)
4 ) Centruroides noxius (0.31mg/kg)
5 ) Androctonus Australis (0.32mg/kg)
6 ) Centruroides santa maria (0.385mg/kg)
7 ) Tityus serrulatus (0.43mg/kg)
8 ) Centruroides suffusus (0.49mg/kg)
9 ) Centruroides limpidus (0.69mg/kg)
10 ) Compsobuthus acuticarinatus (0.75mg/kg)

Maybe I missed something, feel free to check

All androctonus spp should be up there imo since they push out a ton of venom each sting. And no Hottentotta spp has a venom rating of more than 4, maybe 4.5 is pushing it.

wow then i was kinda off there i guess huh ? hahaha

on a healthy adult human it would not be as bad as thought i know that the deaths caused by any of these are because lack of proper medical procedure for this kind of thing
or it is a younger person or older person or they have allergic reactions and realy the worst thing believe it or not in alot envenomations can be shock.

like in the us its quite rare you would die from an envenomation
because of the amount of medical procedures taken with something like that
even when it comes to the venomous snakes theres more chance of you living than dieing
if you are in medical care in the reigh amount of time bla bla bla haha


hottentotta tamulus gangeticus i have had
like this guy haha

but i dont think they are realy that dangerous
it would most defenitly cause alot of pain but on a healthy adult it would cause something like this
pain at the sting site localized swelling tingling some muscle spasms and maybe a little brusing and tenderness to the gerenal sting area
but if you had an allergic reaction or you were elderly or realy young or went into shcok
that where i see the possablity of death with hotentotta tamulus but generly they are not that dangerous (just my personal thoughts on them)


Odontobuthus odonturus i always wondered about those haha now im gonna have to get some somehow and some Odontobuthus doriae just to lad mice test the venom on


yeah ok i feel like im rambling now hahaha

Chrome wrote:

All androctonus spp should be up there imo since they push out a ton of venom each sting. And no Hottentotta spp has a venom rating of more than 4, maybe 4.5 is pushing it.

I don't think the 1-5 rating people use is any good as it has no scientific value and is just how people feel the sting, without anything to compare with (not how seriouse the venom is). You can't really rate a scorpion from the symptoms of the sting and gives it 4-5 as 5 should be the worst case (dead) and 4 should be the step before that (read: very VERY ill) and you can't really know how that is like unless you been there (and not many people gets ressurected from the dead these days ). I've seen a lot of sting reports where people use the numbers 4 and 5 in the same sentence as "the pain was gone in 8 hours" and that's just lame (to me).

And foreksample Androctonus Bicolor only has 1,21mg/kg which is pretty low on the scale (ofcorse it hurts, but...)! Just because it's androctonus, people think they are dangerous It's like here in denmark they banished all species that contained just one sub-species which was near dangerous!

And as Telow pointed out for most scorpions it's only sick, infants or old people that dies (mostly)... Therefor how "deadly" a scorpion is (most casualties) could easily be coupled with where in the world the scorpion is (foreksample: Do the native have bad health due to starvation, deceases or anything else and how is the medical care in the area where the scorpion comes from?) and I think that is why I read that Hottentotta Tamulus was the most deadly scorpion in the world... But we cannot use info like "oh, the Androctonus Australis kills a lot of people each year, so therefore it must be very venomous" for anything as it hails from a whole different region, with dfferent health issues, then we have here in europe or in the US.

Aaaand as far as the allergic reaction goes, it has NEVER been recorded that a human had an allergic reaction to ANY scorpion venom (exept one time when it was combined with fire-ants venom) so let's put that in the ground once and for all

So I think we should stick to what is objective and what WE KNOW (foreksample the LD50) and take that as a fact and not what we think we know, what we expected or what we wanted to be true (buhu, i thought my scorpion was the most lethal and now it's so uncool, because I can't tell my friends that it is ) lol

Now it's my turn to ramble

BTW: Don't take offence (anyone) as none was intended!

René wrote:

Aaaand as far as the allergic reaction goes, it has NEVER been recorded that a human had an allergic reaction to ANY scorpion venom (exept one time when it was combined with fire-ants venom) so let's put that in the ground once and for all

so basically youre saying that if a person has known insect bite allergies
(whether it be a random bee, a wasp, a hornet, a spider, or a little ant)
the scorpion venom wont affect them?

i knew a guy that would get bit by an ant and get local swelling, hives and eventually his throat would swell shut
(that experiment creeped me out)

another is my mom...
shes highly allergic to bee and wasp stings,
so wouldnt she be at some kind of risk if a scorpion, regardless of toxicity, stung her?

im not trying to start anything or take this convo the wrong way, but my whole thought was, there might never be a recorded reaction to the venom, but it doesnt mean people havent had the reaction...

another subject matter
a friend of mine bought 5 b. jacksoni from some breeder in the NW florida area, and me, being the ridiculous courageous idiot that i am, decided to make one mad...
some friendly info, it hurts like hell...but it didnt do much damage...
im almost willing to, from my own experience, say thats its not much worse than an emp tagging you...
btw the stinger connected with the dead top center of my palm

(i need to stop experimenting on myself and people lol)

but anyway, back to the original subject, those are just questions i had about the whole scorpion allergy thing.
no disrespect or any aggression, im just really interested in that subject since i read it lol

it is very rare for someone who was stung by a scorpion to have an allergic reaction
its not realy a common thing that happens so its mostlikely not normal to happen
but it has and can so its more of a caution than anything realy in terms i guess you can say

the 1-5 thing is realy just for keepers breeders collectors ext.
to know what the limits are so its a hobby safety guide i guess haha

but yes just because 1 species causes more deaths than the other does NOT mean
they are the most dangerous species it meant that they are just in close ranges of people
A.A for example lives in some peoples back yards in africa so that close to people
thats why so many stings and deaths and africa has alot of poor places
and not the medical care needed for that so it causes people to die
either snake bites scorpion stings ext enough said i guess on that haha.


but yes a healthy person that gets stung should go to the hospital but they will be in more pain and suffering that close to death unless its a small child or elderly person or has some medical problems but mostly it will scare the crap out of you if its one of the worst to get stung by there scorpions not inland tipans not as bad as people think
but thats where a thing called experience comes in if you dont have it dont get that species
its just like venomous snakes you do NOT get a cobra for your first venomous snake
you will get bit and they can kill you agh again enough said hahaha.


on the b. jacksoni stings there not going to do much to you it just hurts for a little while
but you should be careful and not get stung at all because the first keeper to get stung and badly hurt will be a big brun down of this hobby so (BE CAREFUL DONT GET STUNG)
thats the best way
i

your not going to buy that top 10 list now are you???

your not going to buy that top 10 list now are you???

no the ld50 thing gets anoying to me because its not updated and done with realy any new work its not accurate to me it may be ok but things change new species get found all the time ext theres alot that makes that all crap (just my thoughts)

i will say this again the only dangerous scorpion is the one that stings you

TELOW wrote:

i will say this again the only dangerous scorpion is the one that stings you

i agree...to a point...
id rather be stung by my adult emp than pinched ever again

hahahahahahahah hahahahahahahahahahahahaha
yeah they have a realy good grip

TELOW wrote:

hahahahahahahah hahahahahahahahahahahahaha
yeah they have a realy good grip

y'aint lying...
its the worst pinch i ever received

the lycan mikey wrote:

René wrote:

Aaaand as far as the allergic reaction goes, it has NEVER been recorded that a human had an allergic reaction to ANY scorpion venom (exept one time when it was combined with fire-ants venom) so let's put that in the ground once and for all

so basically youre saying that if a person has known insect bite allergies
(whether it be a random bee, a wasp, a hornet, a spider, or a little ant)
the scorpion venom wont affect them?

i knew a guy that would get bit by an ant and get local swelling, hives and eventually his throat would swell shut
(that experiment creeped me out)

another is my mom...
shes highly allergic to bee and wasp stings,
so wouldnt she be at some kind of risk if a scorpion, regardless of toxicity, stung her?

im not trying to start anything or take this convo the wrong way, but my whole thought was, there might never be a recorded reaction to the venom, but it doesnt mean people havent had the reaction...

another subject matter
a friend of mine bought 5 b. jacksoni from some breeder in the NW florida area, and me, being the ridiculous courageous idiot that i am, decided to make one mad...
some friendly info, it hurts like hell...but it didnt do much damage...
im almost willing to, from my own experience, say thats its not much worse than an emp tagging you...
btw the stinger connected with the dead top center of my palm

(i need to stop experimenting on myself and people lol)

but anyway, back to the original subject, those are just questions i had about the whole scorpion allergy thing.
no disrespect or any aggression, im just really interested in that subject since i read it lol

I never said it haven't happened or isn't possible, I'm just saying it hasn't been recorded, and therefor is highly unlikely! A reaction to a scorpion sting that has some of the same symptoms as an allergic reaction isn't necessarily an allergic reaction, you get me?

And no, being allergic to one specie of insects (or other) doesn't automaticly make you allergic to other species aswell! I know foreksample that an allergi can come from being bitten by a certain type of snake and then the allergic reaction will only come from being bitten from that specie again!

And don't worry, you are not starting anything other then a good discussion

_scorpio_ wrote:

your not going to buy that top 10 list now are you???

Hm, what's wrong with a top ten? Some species must be more toic then others, so therefor some must be the top ten

René wrote:

the lycan mikey wrote:

René wrote:

Aaaand as far as the allergic reaction goes, it has NEVER been recorded that a human had an allergic reaction to ANY scorpion venom (exept one time when it was combined with fire-ants venom) so let's put that in the ground once and for all

so basically youre saying that if a person has known insect bite allergies
(whether it be a random bee, a wasp, a hornet, a spider, or a little ant)
the scorpion venom wont affect them?

i knew a guy that would get bit by an ant and get local swelling, hives and eventually his throat would swell shut
(that experiment creeped me out)

another is my mom...
shes highly allergic to bee and wasp stings,
so wouldnt she be at some kind of risk if a scorpion, regardless of toxicity, stung her?

im not trying to start anything or take this convo the wrong way, but my whole thought was, there might never be a recorded reaction to the venom, but it doesnt mean people havent had the reaction...

another subject matter
a friend of mine bought 5 b. jacksoni from some breeder in the NW florida area, and me, being the ridiculous courageous idiot that i am, decided to make one mad...
some friendly info, it hurts like hell...but it didnt do much damage...
im almost willing to, from my own experience, say thats its not much worse than an emp tagging you...
btw the stinger connected with the dead top center of my palm

(i need to stop experimenting on myself and people lol)

but anyway, back to the original subject, those are just questions i had about the whole scorpion allergy thing.
no disrespect or any aggression, im just really interested in that subject since i read it lol

I never said it haven't happened or isn't possible, I'm just saying it hasn't been recorded, and therefor is highly unlikely! A reaction to a scorpion sting that has some of the same symptoms as an allergic reaction isn't necessarily an allergic reaction, you get me?

And no, being allergic to one specie of insects (or other) doesn't automaticly make you allergic to other species aswell! I know foreksample that an allergi can come from being bitten by a certain type of snake and then the allergic reaction will only come from being bitten from that specie again!

And don't worry, you are not starting anything other then a good discussion

wow you learn something new everyday...
sorry i cant write more at the moment, i gotta 2 yr old demon trying to crawl on my head
(yes i mean that seriously)

I was wondering if people could post their sources? I'm curious about some of the things I have seen and the contradictory data that is all over the place. I read this thread the other day and thought it was interesting as I recalled LQ's having one of the highest toxicity levels but because of their natural local it is rare that people get stung. Not so much a volume thing. I also recalled reading that the AA's take the lead due to both the high toxicity level and the fact that they live around people.
I hadn't heard that on the Hottentotta species until just a few minutes ago reading some stuff on Wikipedia...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hottentotta_tamulus

Quote :

Toxicity

This species is of great medical significance in densely populated areas of India and Nepal and occasionally causes human fatalities.[2][6][7] It is rated the most lethal scorpion species in the world.[8] Fatality rates of 8-40% have been reported in clinical studies, most victims are children.[6][9]

Just curious what feedback people have on this. I can't pretend to know who's who in the badest of the badest competition here but am very curious. I know some of what I typed ^^ is contradictory to some other posts on this thread, please take no offense to it as I'm just repeated what I recalled reading and am hoping for more feedback on this more than anything. Guess I just want to get my facts straight

_scorpio_ wrote:

your not going to buy that top 10 list now are you???

Since there are only 2 sp on that list thats not illegal in Denmark i doubt he is going to buy them..
But 1 ) Odontobuthus doriae (0.19mg/kg) (surprise!!!) is legal in Denmark i myself had servel Odontobuthus


But if you look at what scorpion kills most ppl Androctonus sp. takes the cake.

The LD50 value is worth nothing, it can tell you how potent a venom is but not if the scorpion can kill you. its the amount of venom thats the key, Some sp of snake doesnt have a very high LD50 but since they pump large amounts into you, You tend to die.