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Muar, Malaysia  An ecological and natural history study of the dog-faced water snake (Cerberus rynchops ) and the keel-bellied water snake (Bitia hydroides) was conducted from 1984 to 1986. The study site was an intertidal mud flat at the mouth of the Muar River in the Straits of Malacca between the Malay Peninsula and Sumatra (see map). Some of the results of this work appear in the following publications: Jayne, B. C., H. K. Voris and K. B. Heang. 1988. Diet, feeding behavior, growth and numbers of a population of Cerberus rynchops (Serpentes: Homalopsinae) in Malaysia. Fieldiana, Zoology, New Series No. 50:1-15.
Abstract: Stomach contents were obtained from 181 of 611 Cerberus rynchops captured near the mouth of the Muar River in Malaysia. Sixty-nine percent of the prey items were the goby (Oxuderces dentatus); however, as C. rynchops became larger, ariid catfish, mullet and taenioid gobies became increasingly more important portions of the diet. Feeding behavior was observed for 23 C. rynchops, which consumed 71 mudskippers. Initial seizure of the fish always involved marked lateral flexion of the neck. Snakes often displayed a distinct period of holding the fish before the initiation of swallowing, and this time of holding increased significantly with increased size and struggle of the prey. Jayne, B. C., T. J. Ward and H. K. Voris. 1995. Morphology, reproduction, and diet of the marine homalopsine snake Bitia hydroides in peninsular Malaysia. Copeia (4):800-808. |
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