#urva auropunctata

[snototter]

A small Indian mongoose (Urva auropunctata) in Hawai'i

by matt "smooth tooth" knoth

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Small Indian Mongoose | Arijit Banerjee

[fatehbaz]

it is the hime habu!

Oh cool. Thank you for the confirmation and clarification!

So I think it is true that there are 4 vipers living on Okinawa? And 2 of them are native, while another 2 are introduced?

Ovophis okinavensis (hime habu, princess viper). An endemic species in Ryuku Islands, including Okinawa.

Protobothrops flavoviridis (habu, Okinawa habu). Also an endemic species in Ryuku Islands, including Okinawa.

Non-native, introduced: Protobothrops elegans (Sakishima habu). And though it was introduced to Okinawa, it is still actually a kind of “local” snake and is an endemic species of Ryuku Islands, though it originally naturally lived in Yaeyama Islands (south of Okinawa).

Not native, introduced: Protobothrops mucrosquamatus (brown-spotted pit viper, Taiwan habu) which originally naturally lives across a large stretch of land including most of southern mainland East Asia.

Here's an English-language graphic from Okinawa Prefectural government:

(And then I think the Ryuku Islands are also home to another endemic species of Protobothrops -- P. tokarensis -- which lives in Tokara islands closer to Kyushu?)

Previously, I had read that the small Indian mongoose (Urva auropunctata) was deliberately introduced to Okinawa around 1910, to eliminate rats that fed on profitable sugar cane crops, and also to eliminate habu.

When I first saw that photo/post with the hime habu, I went off and tried to learn more about mongooses on Okinawa.

I found a cool informational/educational pamphlet kind of thing released by The Ministry of the Environment Naha Nature Conservation Office and Okinawa Prefecture Environmental Life Department.

The pamphlet explains the history of mongooses on the island, and also describes the uniqueness of Okinawa's many endangered and/or endemic species including the critically endangered Okinawa woodpecker; an endemic species of leaf turtle; an endemic subspecies of ground gecko; and many cool amphibians like the crocodile newt.

They are all threatened by the mongoose, since there were no native carnivorous mammals living in Yambaru/northern Okinawa before the mongoose arrived.

A similar fate shared by Hawai'i, Fiji, the Caribbean, and Okinawa: The introduction of mongooses to protect colonial cash crops, followed by the death of many birds, snakes, amphibians, etc.

All of those endemic and endangered island creatures of Okinawa... Consider all of that environmental damage resulting from the initial introduction of "merely" 17 mongooses.

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Small Indian Mongoose | Micah Carrick

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Small Indian Mongoose | Robin Gwen Agarwal