Ethnobiological knowledge of the snake Bothrops asper (Garman 1884) in the Alluriquín Parish, Santo Domingo de los Tsáchilas, Ecuador

Abstract

Wildlife in rural communities, has been a constituent and essential element for their livelihoods, using animals for food varied uses: food, symbolic, cultural and medicinal. The present work had the objective of describing the ethnobiological knowledge of the Bothrops asper snake in three areas of the parish of Alluriquín, Santo Domingo de los Tsáchilas, Ecuador. To collect information, semi-structured interviews were used, which were voluntary and applied to 46 people. Villagers identified for the species: ten microhabitats, eight preys or food constituting their diet and two forms of local recognition, further specifying that the rainy season is the period of greatest activity of the snake. They registered for B. asper, four categories of local uses: medicinal (73.4%), food (19%), cultural (5.1%) and commercial (2.5%); on the other hand, four parts or components used were identified for B. asper, the body (meat), the fat or butter, the bile of the snake and the leather or skin; These parts have six different ways of preparation or use, these are: maceration of the body of the snake in local alcoholic beverage, frying of the body of the snake, extraction of butter or fat, extraction of bile, tanning of the skin and skin drying. Similarly, 20 utilities were identified, of which 12 are related to the treatment of diseases or health problems; and the remaining 8 are associated with food, commercial and cultural uses. It was evidenced that there is a high perception of danger, caused by the link of 100% of local inhabitants with direct or indirect ophidic accidents associated with B. asper, this fact has had an impact on the perception of both actions for its conservation (not conserve the species), as in the reaction against human-snake encounters (kill), factors that may be influencing the population density.