Johan Marais

Johan Marais is a herpetologist and naturalist and the founder of the African Snakebite Institute. 

He has written several books on reptiles including the best-sellers A Complete Guide to Snakes of Southern Africa and Snakes and Snakebite in Southern Africa. To date more than half a million copies of his books have been sold.

He is the director of the Kokerboom Biological Research Station, a NPC that owns an 850 hectare farm in the Northern Cape that provides affordable opportunities for MSc and, PhD students as well as researchers to conduct field work. Johan is an extraordinary lecturer at North West University and a Basic Life Support instructor. He is a well-known international speaker and has, in recent years, been an invited speaker on snakes and snakebite in the Netherlands, Spain, the USA, Kenya and India.

Through his own NPO The African Snakebite Institute Foundation he provides free talks to various organisations and medical doctors on snakes, snakebite, first aid for snakebite and the treatment of snakebite. In this regard the African Snakebite Institute has developed over 400 posters of dangerous and common snakes of various cities, towns, regions, provinces and game reserves of Southern Africa as well as some other African countries. He has also developed over 400 booklets of the snakes of various towns, cities and provinces detailing what snakes people may encounter and with information on first aid for snakebite as well as details of local hospitals. These booklets will be available as free downloads from his website africnsnakebiteinstitute.com.

 Another initiative is the free ASI App called ASI Snakes that has had over 400,000 downloads. It contains various resources including snake profiles, spider profiles, scorpion profiles, first aid for snakebite and has over 800 snake removers listed countrywide that can assist with problem snakes.