Material Examined : 2 adults.

Description & Scalation : Body subcylindrical. Head flattened on top, not distinct from neck. Eye with round pupil. Rostral higher than broad, undivided; nasals separated by internasals; no azygous shield separating the internasals or prefrontals. No loreal; 1 preocular in contact with posterior nasal; 2 postoculars; temporals 1+2. Scales smooth imbricate, in 19:19:17 rows; supralabials 7 ( 3rd and 4th in contact with the eye ); infralabials 5, first 4 touching the first pair of genials; a series of scales on lower jaw border posterior to third infralabial; ventrals 229-232, about four times as broad as long; subcaudals 45-47, paired; tail flat; anal divided.

Coloration : Dark bluish above, with 48-52, more or less equal-sized broad black bands, encircling the body and 7 on the tail, yellowish or creamish below. Snout, upper lip scales black; head black with a light blue curved band above. ( Smith’s description of the head with yellow mark; a median elongated patch of yellow on the jaw below and yellow ring upon neck, does not match with the 2 specimens I have examined. )

Natural History : Poorly known, Nocturnal or diurnal in habits. Two indivisuals were observed inside a log, at about 2100hrs at high tide on New Wandoor beach in South Andaman Islands. These snakes come to land mainly during nocturnal high tide. Good swimmer but crawls slowly on land. Feeds on eels and other fish. Comes to land to reproduce, lays 3-10 eggs in caves or crevices. Grows up to 1.3m.

Distribution - India : Andaman and possibly Nicobar Islands. Elsewhere : Indo-Malayan Archipelago, Gulf of Thailand, South China Sea, Philippines, Indonesia and Australian region.

External link : http://reptile-database.reptarium.cz/species?genus=Laticauda&species=laticaudata