Venomous creature with long stinger found in mountains of Iran. See new species (2025)

In the mountains of southern Iran, a new species has been discovered — and it might be deadly.

Researchers armed with ultraviolet lights were searching the Jebal Barez Mountains at night when they noticed the fluorescent creatures, according to a study published April 28 in the peer-reviewed journal Diversity.

Glowing scorpions looked back at them, and several of them were collected and brought to the Jiroft University of Medical Science, according to the study.

There, genetic testing and examination proved the animals belonged to a new species of Hemiscorpius, a dangerous group of scorpions.

Hemiscorpius jiroftensis, or the Jiroft scorpion that derives its name from the county where it was found, ranges in size from 2.7 inches long in females to 3.2 inches long in males, according to the study.

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The animal is generally brown with some darker and lighter sections of the body, including yellow legs and darker brown to black carinae, or keel of the exoskeleton, researchers said.

The scorpion’s stinger, or telson, is “elongate” and “oval,” according to the study, and it’s able to pack a punch.

A related study published in 2023 called this species’ group of arachnids the “most dangerous scorpions in Iran.”

The new species has so far only been found in the Bam and Jiroft counties of Kerman Province, according to the study.

The area has an elevation between about 5,900 and 8,800 feet above sea level and receives about 5. 5 inches of rain per year, according to the study.

The mountain range provides a geographical barrier between the new species and related scorpions, allowing for speciation, or the development of new species, researchers said.

“It is important to understand the geographical distributions and morphological differences among the species of Hemiscorpius to implement appropriate medical responses to envenomation [stings] by these scorpions, which may prove fatal,” researchers said.

Researchers did not describe the sting of the new species.

There are an estimated 40,000 to 50,000 scorpion stings in Iran each year, about 19 of those being fatal. About 95% of the deaths resulting from stings come from members of the Hemiscorpius family, including the death of a 15-year-old boy according to a 2015 case report.

The Jebal Barez Mountains are in southeastern Iran, near the Gulf of Oman.

The research team includes Esmaeil Amiri Ghanat Saman, Hossein Barahoei, Hossein Dehghan, Mohammad Ali Oshaghi, Javad Rafinejad, Amrollah Azarm and Lorenzo Prendini.