Olive snake eel
species of fish

The olive snake eel (Ophichthus rutidoderma, also known as the Derby snake-eel) is an eel in the family Ophichthidae (worm/snake eels). It was described by Pieter Bleeker in 1853, originally under the genus Ophisurus. It is a marine, tropical eel which is known from the Indo-Pacific. It forms burrows in soft sediments in shallow waters, and leads a nocturnal lifestyle. Males can reach a maximum total length of 95 centimetres (37 in).
The olive snake eel's diet consists of finfish.
“Olive snake eel” enters the record as species of fish. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Olive, snake and species can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Datasets, specimens, observations and peer-reviewed methods provide the appropriate test for the technical claims summarized here. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 21, 2021. The linked authority identifier is Q2338127. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1853.
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This entry incorporates text from “Olive snake eel” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.