Yellow-bellied Sea Snake

• It is the only completely oceanic snake in the world: it never touches land, gives birth at sea and lets the currents carry it, turning up from East Africa to the coast of California.
• It drinks rainwater: it cannot process salt water, so it waits for downpours and sips the thin layer of fresh water left floating on the surface of the sea, and can go months dehydrated while it waits.
• It hunts by floating motionless in the drift lines where debris and small fish gather, and strikes backwards with a speed that is surprising in an animal that looks adrift.

Skeleton type

Vertebrate - internal bony skeleton (reptile)

Habitat and environment

Surface waters of the open tropical Indian and Pacific Oceans

Sexual maturity

2 years

Gestation / incubation

6 months of gestation

Litter / clutch size

4 live young

Sources consulted: Wikipedia (es): Hydrophis platurus