Four home-grown apps on snakes from Kerala
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Many of us have ophidiophobia, the concern of snakes. In reality, it’s the mostly reported phobia amongst people, making the supply of information about this misunderstood creature essential. Help is at hand within the type of 4 Android-only apps devoted to snakes launched in Kerala — SARPA, SnakeHub, Snake Lens and Snakepedia.
Kerala is residence to over 100 species of snakes that belong to 12 households. Of these, the commonest venomous ones are generally known as the massive 4: spectacled cobra, Indian krait, Russell’s viper and saw-scaled viper.
The apps, in addition to that includes scientific information about snakes, species present in Kerala and their habitat throughout the state, additionally embrace details about harmful and innocent varieties, dos and don’ts for snakebite, remedy and misconceptions, contact numbers of snake rescuers, in addition to hospitals the place anti-venom is out there. There can also be a phase to hunt the assistance of specialists. Here are a couple of highlights:
SARPA
Snake Awareness, Rescue and Protection App (SARPA) is a enterprise of Kerala Forests and Wildlife Department in affiliation with Wildlife Trust of India. It is meant to streamline rescue of snakes, to minimise human-snake battle and create consciousness in regards to the reptile. “Although we don’t know the reason behind the sudden influx of apps on snakes, the Department has been on it for sometime because it has been an untouched area. Nobody talked about rescuing snakes, they just kill them eventhough not all snakes are poisonous. We wanted to bring in a system to bring down such incidents,” says Surendrakumar, Chief Wildlife Warden and Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (Wildlife).
From the coaching programme in snake dealing with organised by Kerala Forests and Wildlife Department
| Photo Credit:
Special arrangement
The app was launched in June final yr. “There have been several unfortunate instances in the state involving snakes in the recent times,” says Muhammed Anvar, deputy director, State Forest Training Institute, Arippa. Last, yr the Forest Department educated officers and volunteers to deal with snakes. “Of the 1,150 people who attended the training, 850 got certification, and 290 have registered in the app. Some of them don’t have smartphones while a few are not adept at using mobile applications. So we are giving them weekly online training,” Anvar says. He provides that the listing of rescuers, printed on the Department’s web site, is utilized by different apps as properly.
From the coaching programme in snake dealing with organised by Kerala Forests and Wildlife Department
| Photo Credit:
Special arrangement
When a snake is noticed, {a photograph} is taken and uploaded onto the app. Forest officers and the handlers/rescuers then get an alert. “A picture of the snake’s burrow is enough to identify the location. If a handler doesn’t accept the alert within stipulated time, our staff can assign it to another handler. It will be passed on until the rescue is done,” Anvar explains.
Snakepedia
Launched early this month, Snakepedia has a group of docs, snake researchers, photographers and environmentalists behind it.
Says Dr Jinesh PS, who specialises in forensic drugs and is part of the 20-member core group of Snakepedia, “People die due to snakebite, mainly because they don’t go for proper treatment on time. At the same time, harmless snakes are getting killed. So we started a Facebook group, Keralathile Pambukal Snakes of Kerala in 2015, to create awareness about various aspects related to snakes. It now has over 31,000 members. We also have two WhatsApp groups for doctors working in the casualty wing of hospitals to help them attend to snakebite cases. Snakepedia is an extension of what we have been doing till now. It took a year to fine-tune the whole thing, especially to create content in English and Malayalam.”
In addition to 700-odd photographs, infographics and articles, the Android-based software has podcasts as properly. “We have images provided by 130 photographers and some of them are rare shots. As for the list of hospitals, we have 170 of them, including private hospitals,” says Jinesh, including that they’re exploring the potential for utilizing Artificial Intelligence sooner or later.
“All said and done, it is important to note that in the event of a snakebite immediately go to the nearby hospital instead of asking an expert and waiting for a reply. Also, don’t get yourself bitten trying to take a picture of the snake,” Jinesh says.
SnakeHub
The “comprehensive database on snakes”, launched in October, has been developed by Indriyam Biologics, a startup incubated at SCTIMST-TIMed, the expertise enterprise incubator on the Sree Chitra Tirunal Institute for Medical Sciences and Technology in Thiruvananthapuram. “It is an education app that has in-depth information of different species of snakes in English and Malayalam. The free data can be used as reference material,” says Dileep Kumar R, director of the startup.
Besides offering a elementary concept in regards to the reptiles, the app additionally has offered color codes.to know the toxicity of assorted species: inexperienced for non-venomous, yellow for mildly venomous, orange for venomous (often non-fatal) and crimson for venomous (doubtlessly deadly).
“This is a preliminary version of the app. We plan to include information about species in other states in respective regional languages. We want to make it an interactive platform. Awareness campaigns about snakes are also being done through the app,” Dileep explains.
Snake Lens
An initiative of MVR Snake Park and Zoo at Parassinikkadavu in Kannur district, the app was made obtainable in October. It has the technical help of Lares.AI, a Kochi-based startup, and COSTECH (Kerala State Cooperative Institute of Information Technology Electronics and Communications).
“The park was started in the 1980s as an offshoot of the snake bite treatment centre at Pappinissery, which was opened in 1964. Earlier, those who brought victims of snakebites to the Centre also used to bring the snake, dead, alive or hurt. Even though such instances have come down, not many people know that all snakes are not poisonous. This app will act as a tool to educate people,” says E Kunhiraman, director of the park.
The app is an Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based software for classification and identification of snakes. The database has photographs of various toxic snakes present in Kerala and look-alikes. “We have uploaded images of common snakes as of now. The app has on-edge processing, which means that Internet connection is not needed for identification of snakes,” says Mohamed Zakeer, CEO of Larus.AI. Queries may be directed to specialists on the Snake Park.
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