Laticauda
5 species
Sea kraits are a genus of venomous elapid sea snakes (Sub-family: Laticaudinae), Laticauda. 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. Unlike fully aquatic ovoviviparous sea snakes, sea kraits are oviparous and must come to land to digest prey and lay eggs. They also have independent evolutionary origins into aquatic habitats, with sea kraits diverging earlier from other Australasian elapids. Thus, sea kraits and sea snakes are an example of convergent evolution into aquatic habitats within the Hydrophiinae snakes. Sea kraits are also often confused with land kraits (genus Bungarus), which are not aquatic.
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. 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. 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.
Sea kraits are a genus of venomous elapid sea snakes (Sub-family: Laticaudinae), Laticauda. 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. Unlike fully aquatic ovoviviparous sea snakes, sea kraits are oviparous and must come to land to digest prey and lay eggs. They also have independent evolutionary origins into aquatic habitats, with sea kraits diverging earlier from other Australasian elapids. Thus, sea kraits and sea snakes are an example of convergent evolution into aquatic habitats within the Hydrophiinae snakes. Sea kraits are also often confused with land kraits (genus Bungarus), which are not aquatic.
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. 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. 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.
