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"Furthermore, one experiment conducted with pit vipers demonstrated an 11% increase in metabolic activity following venom extraction, indicating a link between physical exertion and venom production."

The article points out in a few places that venom production does have significant costs.

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> The article points out in a few places that venom production does have significant costs.

You are confusing venom production with the lethality of said venom.

Nowhere does it imply that making a very lethal venom costs more than making a less lethal one.

So replenishing venom supplies may result in an increased metabolic load post-extraction, but that increase may not be so much when compared to another method of hunting. For example, it's probable that the heightened metabolic load associated with a python crushing/strangling its prey is a substantial increase from the animal's ~ergodic resting state.

If anyone has numbers on this, please link them!

Also, injections are probably not going to be clean and ideal. Having a toxin that does the job o(1000)-fold with a full delivery volume will still do the job with a tiny fraction of that in the event of a partial toxin delivery. This will still result in the death of the prey with a single, albeit flawed, attack.

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