It's been a long time since this topic was last discussed, I think...
so, apologies if I am going over old ground but I stumbled across this website:
http://snakedatabase.org/pages/LD50.phpwhich seems to show Vipera berus as being more dangerous (as defined by LD50IV on mice, at least...) than, say Vipera aspis (relative values are 0.55mg/kg and 1.0mg/kg respectively).
Now I know there are lots of caveats - LD50 for mice does not equate to LD50 for human beings, for one. According to this site, though, both aspis and berus yield 18mg of venom when milked, so maybe we can discount differences in quantities of venom injected during a bite (a big maybe, perhaps, since 'capacity' and 'volume' are not always the same thing...)
If the site is correct, then berus is placed quite near some much more 'deadly' snakes - Montivipera xanthina has a LD50IV of 0.61mg/kg.
My questions are:
1 - does this site contain valid information?
2 - how would you rate the danger of berus compared with other species of viper? - the link above (from 2011!) seems no longer to work. Does anyone have a definitive ranking for LD50's in European vipers - maybe something has been published since 2011?
Grateful for any thoughts/ leads, as ever.