The buff striped keelback (''Amphiesma stolatum'') is a

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...

of nonvenomous

colubrid Colubridae (, commonly known as colubrids , from la, coluber, 'snake') is a family of snakes. With 249 genera, it is the largest snake family. The earliest species of the family date back to the Oligocene epoch. Colubrid snakes are found on ev ...

snake Snakes are elongated, limbless, carnivorous reptiles of the suborder Serpentes . Like all other squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales. Many species of snakes have skulls with several more j ...

found across

Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an are ...

. It is a typically nonaggressive snake that feeds on

frog A frog is any member of a diverse and largely carnivorous group of short-bodied, tailless amphibians composing the order Anura (ανοὐρά, literally ''without tail'' in Ancient Greek). The oldest fossil "proto-frog" ''Triadobatrachus'' is ...

s and

toad Toad is a common name for certain frogs, especially of the family Bufonidae, that are characterized by dry, leathery skin, short legs, and large bumps covering the parotoid glands. A distinction between frogs and toads is not made in scient ...

s. It belongs to the subfamily

Natricinae The Natricinae are a subfamily of colubroid snakes, sometimes referred to as a family (Natricidae). The subfamily comprises 37 genera. Members include many very common snake species, such as the European grass snakes, and the North American wa ...

, and is closely related to water snakes and

grass snake The grass snake (''Natrix natrix''), sometimes called the ringed snake or water snake, is a Eurasian non-venomous colubrid snake. It is often found near water and feeds almost exclusively on amphibians. Subspecies Many subspecies are recognized ...

s. It resembles an Asian version of the American

garter snake Garter snake is a common name for generally harmless, small to medium-sized snakes belonging to the genus ''Thamnophis'' in the family Colubridae. Native to North and Central America, species in the genus ''Thamnophis'' can be found from the ...

. It is quite a common snake but is rarely seen.

Anatomy and morphology

A small, slender snake, the buff striped keelback is generally olive-brown to gray in colour. The head and the body are of the same colour. The body of the buff striped keelback is short, and it has a long slender tail which is almost a quarter of its length. Two yellow stripes along the length and to the sides of the spine are the distinctive feature of this snake. These stripes are diffuse at the head and are especially bright on the second half of its body. The keelback has irregular blackish crossbars on the body. Near the head the crossbars are prominent, whereas on the second half of the snake they become diffuse. The sides of the head are yellow, and the head tapers to form a distinctive neck. The nape is red during the breeding season. The chin and throats are white or sometimes orange. There are black vertical markings in front of and behind the large eyes. The eyes have large round pupils with golden flecks on the iris. The forked tongue is black. The underside is pale cream and has small black spots scattered along both the margins. It has

keeled scales Keeled scales refer to reptile scales that, rather than being smooth, have a ridge down the center that may or may not extend to the tip of the scale, Campbell, J. A., Lamar, W. W. (2004). ''The Venomous Reptiles of the Western Hemisphere''. Itha ...

on the

dorsal Dorsal (from Latin ''dorsum'' ‘back’) may refer to: * Dorsal (anatomy), an anatomical term of location referring to the back or upper side of an organism or parts of an organism * Dorsal, positioned on top of an aircraft's fuselage * Dorsal c ...

surface of the body.

Morphs

Buff-Striped Keelback ( Amphiesma stolata erythrostictus) 07

There are two distinct colour varieties – a typical variety, found everywhere, with grayish-blue interscale colour. The second variety, ''erythrostictus'', is common mainly in coastal areas and has bright vermillion interscale colour. The interscale colours become visible only when the snake puffs itself up when agitated.

Identifying characteristics

# The nasal shield does not touch the second supralabial (upper lip shield). # The rostral touches a total of 6 shields. These are two inter-nasals, two nasals and the first supralabial on each side. # Presence of single temporal shield. # Nineteen rows of costals which are strongly keeled except for the outer row which is perfectly smooth. # Presence of stripes. # Ventrals 125–161. # Anal divided. # Subcaudals 50–85.

Size

The Buff Striped keelback is usually 40 to 50 cm (about 16 to 20 inches) in total length. The maximum length recorded is . Females are consistently longer than the males which only rarely reach in length.

Distribution

The buff striped keelback is found throughout South and

Southeast Asia Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical south-eastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of mainlan ...

. Its range extends from

Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 243 million people, and has the world's second-lar ...

( Sindh) to Sri Lanka,

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

(including the Andaman Islands),

Bangladesh Bangladesh (}, ), officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh, is a country in South Asia. It is the eighth-most populous country in the world, with a population exceeding 165 million people in an area of . Bangladesh is among the mos ...

Nepal Nepal (; ne, :ne:नेपाल, नेपाल ), formerly the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal ( ne, सङ्घीय लोकतान्त्रिक गणतन्त्र नेपाल ), is a landlocked country in S ...

Myanmar Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John Wells explai ...

Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is b ...

, Laos,

Cambodia Cambodia (; also Kampuchea ; km, កម្ពុជា, UNGEGN: ), officially the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochinese Peninsula in Southeast Asia, spanning an area of , bordered by Thailan ...

Vietnam Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making i ...

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...

(

Borneo Borneo (; id, Kalimantan) is the third-largest island in the world and the largest in Asia. At the geographic centre of Maritime Southeast Asia, in relation to major Indonesian islands, it is located north of Java, west of Sulawesi, and ea ...

Sabah Sabah () is a state of Malaysia located in northern Borneo, in the region of East Malaysia. Sabah borders the Malaysian state of Sarawak to the southwest and the North Kalimantan province of Indonesia to the south. The Federal Territory o ...

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...

and China (

Hainan Hainan (, ; ) is the smallest and southernmost province of the People's Republic of China (PRC), consisting of various islands in the South China Sea. , the largest and most populous island in China,The island of Taiwan, which is slightly l ...

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delta i ...

Fujian Fujian (; alternately romanized as Fukien or Hokkien) is a province on the southeastern coast of China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, Guangdong to the south, and the Taiwan Strait to the east. Its cap ...

Jiangxi Jiangxi (; ; formerly romanized as Kiangsi or Chianghsi) is a landlocked province in the east of the People's Republic of China. Its major cities include Nanchang and Jiujiang. Spanning from the banks of the Yangtze river in the north int ...

). It is also found in

Bhutan Bhutan (; dz, འབྲུག་ཡུལ་, Druk Yul ), officially the Kingdom of Bhutan,), is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is situated in the Eastern Himalayas, between China in the north and India in the south. A mountainou ...

. In India, the snake is found up to an altitude of .

Conservation status

The buff striped keelback is common throughout its range, and is not of international conservation concern.

Ecology and life history

Habitat

This terrestrial, diurnal snake inhabits well-watered lowland plains and hills

Feeding ecology

The primary diet of adult ''A. stolatum'' is small amphibians such as

s and

s, but they are also known to consume

fish Fish are aquatic, craniate, gill-bearing animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish as well as various extinct related groups. Approximately 95% of ...

, earthworms and geckos.

Life history

Striped Keelback By Capt Suresh Sharma IMG 1183

Keelbacks are oviparous. Mating is thought to take place during the aestivation period. Gravid females have been found from April to August and eggs are laid in underground holes from May to September. The snake lays a clutch of 5 to 10 pure white eggs. Females remain with eggs till they hatch. The young snakes are 13 to 17 cm at birth and eat small

tadpole A tadpole is the larval stage in the biological life cycle of an amphibian. Most tadpoles are fully aquatic, though some species of amphibians have tadpoles that are terrestrial. Tadpoles have some fish-like features that may not be found ...

s, fish, earthworms and

insect Insects (from Latin ') are pancrustacean hexapod invertebrates of the class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body ( head, thorax and abdomen), three ...

Behavior

The buff striped keelback is diurnal, and although mostly seen on land, it can readily take to water. It has long rear teeth for catching frogs and toads. The buff striped keelback is nonvenomous and totally harmless. When alarmed, it inflates its body causing the bright interscale colours to be exposed. Sometimes, the snake flattens and narrows its head to form a hood. This behaviour sometimes causes the species to be mistaken by laypersons for a baby cobra. The snake aestivates during hot weather and appears at the end of summer. It is abundant during the rains. In north India, the striped keelback hibernates 25 to 45 cm (about 10 to 18 inches) under the ground in soil, amongst grass roots.

Gallery

Image:AB018_buff_striped_keelback.jpg, A buff-striped keelback (normal form) Image:AB023_buff_striped_keelback_6.jpg, The body of the snake Image:AB022_buff_striped_keelback_5.jpg, The snake being held by the head Image:AB021_buff_striped_keelback_4.jpg, The snake twisting its head while being held.

References

Bibliography

* 1890. ''The Fauna of British India, Including Ceylon and Burma. Reptilia and Batrachia''. Secretary of State for India in Council. (Taylor and Francis, Printers). London. xviii + 541 pp. (''Tropidonotus stolatus'', pp. 348–349.) * 1893. ''Catalogue of the Snakes in the British Museum (Natural History). Volume I., Containing the Families...Colubridæ Aglyphæ, Part.'' Trustees of the British Museum (Natural History). (Taylor and Francis, Printers). London. xiii + 448 pp. + Plates I.-XXVIII. (''Tropidonotus stolatus'', pp. 253–254.) * ; , ; & . 1998. ''A Photographic Guide to Snakes and Other Reptiles of Peninsular Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand''. Ralph Curtis Publishing. Sanibel Island, Florida. 144 pp. * 2002. ''Book of Indian Reptiles and Amphibians''. BNHS. Oxford University Press. Mumbai. * 1999. ''Biogeography of the amphibians and reptiles of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, India''. In: Ota, H. (ed) Tropical Island herpetofauna. Elsevier, pp. 43–77. * 2002. ''A Photographic Guide to Snakes and Other Reptiles of India''. Ralph Curtis Books. Sanibel Island, Florida. 144 pp. . ''(Amphiesma stolatum'', p. 19.) * 1758. ''Systema Naturae''. 10th Edition: 204 pp. * 1921. ''Ophidia Taprobanica or the Snakes of Ceylon''. Colombo Museum. (H.R. Cottle, government printer). Colombo. xxii + 581 pp. * 2006. ''Common Indian Snakes - A Field Guide''. Revised edition. MacMillan India Ltd. New Delhi.

External links

*
Museum Adolphi Friderici

* * * {{Taxonbar, from1=Q2370818, from2=Q2384149 Amphiesma Snakes of Vietnam Snakes of Southeast Asia Reptiles of Myanmar Reptiles of Cambodia Reptiles of China Reptiles of India Reptiles of Laos Reptiles of Nepal Reptiles of Pakistan Reptiles of the Philippines Reptiles of Sri Lanka Reptiles of Taiwan Reptiles of Thailand Reptiles of Vietnam Reptiles described in 1758 Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus Reptiles of Borneo