Google Earth Uncovers New Forest

It looks like Google Earth has other uses besides locating your own house from a satellite photo. Some scientists in the U.K. used it for a far more noteworthy purpose - to explore a little patch of green in Mozambique that turns out to be uncharted highland forest.

In the process the researchers discovered several new species in the 17,000-acre woodland, including three new species of Lepidoptera butterfly and a new member of the Gaboon viper family of snakes that can kill a human in a single bite.

An expedition with 28 scientists and 70 porters, led by a team from the Royal Botanic Gardens in Kew, were dispatched to see what was on the ground and found hundreds of different plant species, birds, butterflies and monkeys.

The mountainous area of northern Mozambique had been overlooked by scientists due to inhospitable terrain and decades of civil war in the country, and are increasingly under threat as residents log and clear the land for fuel or agriculture.

(Photo by fffriendly)