We have a new website, please check snakeDB.org! It's much faster & nicer than the old version!

Hydrophis stokesii

Large Headed Sea Snake

Venomous 💀💀💀💀 Very dangerous bite ref
Images automatically provided by Flickr & iNaturalist. Sporadic false assignment does occur.

Warning. 

An aggressive species that will bite multiple times. Serious envenomation, but not fatal bite accidents known so far.

Description. 

These are massive snakes with a heavy body. Body diameter can reach up to 30 cm.

  • Length Adult

  • up to 200 cm ref

  • Length Newborn

  • 30 to 30.5 cm ref

  • Reproduction

  • live birth (not specific) ref

  • Pupil Shape (when closed!)

  • round (or oval) ref

  • Fangs

  • fixed ref front-fanged ref

  • Teeth/Fang Length

  • 7 mm ref

Altitude range

Vertical distribution

-10 meter above sea level (a.s.l.) ref

Subspecies & Common Names

Hydrophis stokesii  ENGLISH Large Headed Sea Snake, Spiny Headed Sea Snake, Stoke's Sea Snake, FRENCH Astrotie De Stokes, GERMAN Stokes Seeschlange, SINHALA Maha Valakkadiya, UNCODED LANGUAGES Daryai Mar, Samundri Sanp ref

Full Taxonomy

  • I. Superfamily Colubroidea

  • Colubrids, elapids and vipers

  • II. Family Elapidae

  • Elapids

  • III. Subfamily Hydrophiinae

  • Sea snakes

  • IV. Genus Hydrophis

  • Sea snakes

  • V. Species Hydrophis stokesii

  • Large headed Sea Snake

  • VI. snakeID

  • 576
Look up complete taxonomic records of Hydrophis stokesii (including synonyms) at THE REPTILE DATABASE (by Peter Uetz et al).