Nigel comes face-to-face with the Philippine cobra, the most lethally venomous cobra on the planet. In deep, dark caves on Palawan Island, the presenter searches for giant reticulated pythons sheltering from the heat of the day. The Philippines eagle, the largest eagle in the world, swoops down to snatch snakes from the treetops.

With an infra-red camera in the dead of night we watch a forest pit-viper sense and strike a target just fractionally warmer than its surroundings We film a hunting mussurana – a snake that not only eats poisonous snakes but is immune to their venom Macro photography shows the spectacular irridescent scales of the non-venomous but beautiful Rainbow boa.

Extending a fibre-optic camera into the intricate tunnels of a leafcutter ant nest, we uncover a Central American coral snake sharing the burrow of the ant colony Nigel meets a rattlesnake without a rattle – the Santa Catalinapit viper has evolved to become silent in order to stalk birds A young Mexican cantil uses its bright white tail tip to attract prey close enough for a deadly strike.

The burrowing asp, a snake that can bite you without even opening its mouth The saw-scaled viper – hidden in the sand until you hear its eerie threat display A snake straight out of a sci-fi story; the spider-tailed adder entices its prey in with a bizarre arachnid-shaped lure.