Is this a buried baby turtle head?

This is a frame capture from a HiDef video I took...... looks like some sort of snapping turtle buried in a hole in about 20 feet of salt water in Puerto Galera, Philippines.

The head was about the size between a marble and a ping pong ball.

I think it is a reptile snake eel (genus Brachysomophis). Check some more photos here:

http://filaman.ifm-geomar.de/Photos/Thumbn...ry.php?ID=12887

http://www.vibrantsea.net/snakeeel16_anilao30.htm

yep, snake eel. i got one in Anilao

The links had photos that still made me wonder, so I started surfing around the genus and came up with a photo that looked identical with the exception of the color red. This one is called a Stargazer Snake Eel.

I came upon Brachysomophis cirrocheilo and it had the characteristic flattened area behind the head, and same face/mouth structure and the eye that was camouflaged.

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=htt...6lr%3D%26sa%3DG

Mike, you left P.G. a few days before I arrived, would have been nice to meet you.....

aha... good on the latin, i needed to find that myself!!

I am goin back in August...

I am sure Matt at Atlantis told you lots of bad things about me

Actually Matt said nothing, but there was a chap that I think was from Canada, big into still photography...I would always turn around underwater and see him upside down with his head about 1 foot away from the bottom taking some macro shot.....very pleasant fellow...he spoke highly of you...

I definately want to go back too now that I have a better handle on running the videocam...., didn'tlike the mosquitoes and the humidity, but that place was diving paradise, and Atlantis runs a top notch operation. Really pleasant islanders there to. Even the front desk helped me get a later flight out allowing me to stay longer.

Attached is a Stargzer snake eel photo I foudn lurking somewhere on the Internet