Thanks, El Niño: Poisonous Sea Snake Spotted in California

The yellow-bellied sea snake has highly poisonous venom.

The LA Times notes that the last time the yellow-bellied sea snakes made their way to the California coast was back in the 1980s during El Niño.

Without a doubt, El Nino weather events disrupt the normal cycle of things all over the world, from killer typhoons in the Pacific to droughts and the migration of tropical marine species into waters further north of their regular habitats.It just depends on where you happen to live geographically, with how your region will be impacted.

The snake may have been drawn up toward California by El Niño water temperatures.

Greg Pauly, the herpetology curator at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, indicated it was rare to see one of the snakes washed up on a beach. In the comments, Facebook user responded by posting her own photo of a yellow-bellied snake she'd also spotted on the same beach on Thursday, and wrote, "It was alive when we first spotted it but seemed to be dying".

These unsafe creatures typically spend their entire lives in the ocean, and this is the first time the animal has been spotted in the Southern California area in about 30 years, the group said, calling it a harbinger of El Niño.

The snake found Friday died shortly after being transported to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's office in Ventura, according to the Los Angeles Times. And report it."Heal the Bay the following photo to their blog informing beach-goers to snap photos and provide detailed location information of yellow-bellied sea snake sightings".