Top 10 Most Dangerous Animals in Europe

The brown bear reigns in the Carpathians, Scandinavia and parts of southern Europe. A mother bear with cubs tolerates no approach at all and can reach speeds of 50 km/h.

Widespread in the Netherlands and all of Europe. A large boar with razor-sharp tusks can lash out dangerously when it feels threatened or is with piglets.

The only venomous snake in the Netherlands and Western Europe. A bite is rarely fatal for a healthy adult, but does require immediate medical care against tissue damage and allergic reactions.

Europe's heaviest land mammal can weigh almost a thousand kilos. It looks peaceful grazing quietly, but can charge unexpectedly and with devastating force.

Fully back in the Netherlands and Western Europe. Wolves are shy of people, but remain powerful apex predators with an impressive hunting capacity.

Regularly drifts into the Mediterranean and the Atlantic coasts of Spain and Portugal. Its thirty-meter tentacles cause extremely painful welts and sometimes cardiac arrest.

Buries itself in the sand on Dutch and French beaches. If you step on it barefoot, it injects venom through its dorsal fin that causes hellish, burning pain.

Found around the Mediterranean. Its bite contains a neurotoxin that causes severe muscle cramps, nausea and high blood pressure.

Spreading rapidly through Europe. A hornet nest reacts extremely aggressively to vibrations and can sting by the dozens at once, causing serious allergic reactions.

Tiny, but statistically by far the most dangerous animal in Europe because it transmits Lyme disease and the TBE virus (tick-borne encephalitis).