1/17/2024 0 Comments Black and white striped snakesBites are rare, but must be treated immediately. Though they possess highly toxic venom, these snakes are usually shy and reclusive, and in New Caledonia, where they are called tricot rayƩ ("stripey sweater"), children play with them. Laticauda species are often active at night, which is when they prefer to hunt. They have never been observed feeding on land. Laticauda species feed in the ocean, mostly eating moray and conger eels, and some squid, crabs, and fish. Sea kraits typically live in the littoral zone of coastal waters and are semi-terrestrial, spending time ashore and in shallow waters, as well as around coral reefs. The species occasionally wanders south to the Eastern coast of Australia and New Zealand ( Laticauda colubrina being the most common example in New Zealand), however no known locally breeding populations are known to exist in these areas. Laticauda species are found throughout the South and Southeast Asian islands spreading from India in the west, north as far as Japan, and southeast to Fiji. Members of Laticauda can grow to 1.5 m (4.9 ft) long. Their body has a striped pattern, nasal scales are separated by inter-nasals scales, and the maxillary bone extends forwards beyond the palatine bone. They have a vertically flattened and paddle-shaped tail (similar to sea snakes) and laterally positioned nostrils and broad, laterally expanded ventral scales (similar to terrestrial elapids). Laticauda species show traits intermediate between those of sea snakes and terrestrial elapids. Sea kraits are semiaquatic, so have morphological adaptations to both land and sea. Sea kraits are also often confused with land kraits (genus Bungarus), which are not aquatic. Thus, sea kraits and sea snakes are an example of convergent evolution into aquatic habitats within the Hydrophiinae snakes. They also have independent evolutionary origins into aquatic habitats, with sea kraits diverging earlier from other Australasian elapids. Unlike fully aquatic ovoviviparous sea snakes, sea kraits are oviparous and must come to land to digest prey and lay eggs. They are semiaquatic, and retain the wide ventral scales typical of terrestrial snakes for moving on land, but also have paddle-shaped tails for swimming. Sea kraits are a genus of venomous elapid sea snakes (subfamily: Laticaudinae), Laticauda.
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