The holotype was collected at Doré on the Vogelkop of Netherlands New Guinea, and described in 1829, by the naturalist on board the French Navy vessel La Coquille, ship's surgeon René Primevère Lesson, in a volume of the three-year circumnavigation (1922-1925) by Louis Isidore Duperrey, captain of La Coquille.

M. ikaheca fasciatus, the banded form, described by German herpetologist and ichthyologist, Johann Gustav Fischer in 1884, is found throughout the rest of New Guinea.

[2] The name ikaheca means "land eel" in a local West Papuan dialect, indicating the snake's preference for damp or semi-aquatic habitats, such as swamps, creeks, wetlands, low-lying rainforest, and piles of discarded vegetation debris, i.e. oil palm windrows, and coconut palm husk piles.

The first proven human fatality occurred in 1958 in Wau, Papua New Guinea, where a young man died 36 hours after being bitten on the base of the thumb while handling the snake.

[6] Another envenomation occurred when a villager reportedly killed a specimen, but was then bitten on the left thumb by the "dead" snake when showing it to his neighbors (this bite may be due to postmortem reflex action).

[2] M. ikaheca is responsible for approximately 40% of all snake envenomations on Karkar Island, but less than 10% on the mainland, where the majority of snakebites are caused by the death adders.