Reptile & Amphibian Forums

While staying at Sandals Royal Carribean a few years back, I recall seeing a "snake" that was quite large (3-4 feet)that appeared to be black and white striped. I recall seeing 2 of them while there x1 week. One was in a shallow pool of water near our breakfast deck- I watched it slither out of the water and up onto land (exploring on the rocks for several minutes) before it slithered back in and swam away. The other one I saw while snorkeling. It was swimming at the bottom in about 12-15ft of water. I once read my son a book about sea kraits and told him how mommy saw one in Jamaica. I then did some research for him (I am taking him with me to Jamaica in Nov.) and discovered that the Carribean Sea doesn't have snakes, only eels. I looked up all eels and found the brown saddled eel- or half-banded snake eel may have been my sighting, except not quite.... It really did look/act like a snake and came out on land. It also looked very BLACK/white, not brown. I saw it close and distinctly 2 separate times(it did not appear to have an eel head). Any ideas?

Hmmm... They're not supposed to be there and I'm not aware of (and can't find) a verified sighting, but it certainly SOUNDS like a krait.

Captive eels are notorious for climbing out of aquariums (and dying) so it's not out of the question that one could leave the water, but I expect it would be just to get from a drying pool back into the ocean. I suspect they would be pretty helpless out of the water (I've never witnessed it) and doubt one would be out wandering around.

It's certainly possible that a krait could hitch a ride, maybe in a ship's ballast... Who knows.
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What goes up must come down...unless it exceeds escape velocity.