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| Crocodile Hunter Steve Irwin |
Not quite fearless, For a guy who didn't mind being face-to-face with angry crocodiles, Irwin still had a couple of animals he was terrified. In a 2001 clip, Irwin can be seen paddling down a river in Zambia when he comes across a group of hippos. According to Terri Irwin's voiceover, hippo groups aren't just dangerous; they're unpredictable. When Scientific American asked Irwin what animal he wasn't comfortable with, he responded, "Parrots. Yeah, for some reason parrots have to bite me. That's their job. I don't know why that is. They've nearly torn my nose off. I've had some nasty parrot bites."
No anti-venom, In a 1991 TV appearance on a local kids show, Irwin had just finished explaining why his non-venomous python won't bite him when things took an unsettling turn. With bites coming so unexpectedly, you'd assume Irwin would have traveled with a stash of antivenom. But according to what he told Reptiles Magazine, he never carried any with him. His reason? "When I grab hold of them, this karma exudes through my fingertips into the animal, and they feel a lot more comfortable, and I don't get bitten. And I take great pride [that] I don't get envenomated. I don't carry antivenin, never have, never will.
Complete support, When Larry King talked to Irwin in 2004, not much time had passed since Siegfried, and Roy's famous tiger act went terribly. Reactions were mixed, as many people didn't think it was appropriate to keep wild animals in that kind of environment. But Irwin said it was nothing short of tragic, and chimed in with his complete support of acts like theirs, explaining, "They did what not many people can do. They got tigers into people's hearts. I believe that the time has come where if we don't get animals into people's hearts, they're going to go extinct. We're running out of time right now."
Source: YouTube by Grunge
