By Herp News

A sea turtle that was rescued from frigid Northwest waters and treated at the Oregon Coast Aquarium has caught a ride back to California on a Coast Guard training flight.

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By Herp News

A sea turtle that was rescued from frigid Northwest waters and treated at the Oregon Coast Aquarium in Newport is catching a ride back to California on a Coast Guard training flight.

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By Herp News

The Lizard Squad collective took credit for the attack, which is still under investigation by Lenovo.

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By Herp News

What is the dunes sagebrush lizard? The small, light-brown reptile, also known as the sand dunes lizard, seeks refuge from the sun and potential predators beneath stands of shinnery oak, a relatively rare tree that thrives in the dunes of West Texas and New Mexico.

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By Herp News

In a first-of-its-kind case, a pair of conjoined lizards called Quince monitor lizards were discovered at a German zoo, according to a new report.

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By Herp News

A nearly complete fossil of a prehistoric marine reptile with preserved soft tissue has been found in central-western Colombia, at a spot several hundred miles from the Caribbean coast, a university in this capital said.

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By Herp News

Paddling its flippers into the surf Tuesday will be the 150th sea turtle to be rehabilitated and then released by the South Carolina Aquarium. It will be among five cold-stunned turtles to return to the ocean.

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By Herp News

A three-alarm fire at a brew pub injured three people, including two firefighters, Tuesday morning in Ocean City.

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By Herp News

A sea turtle that was rescued from frigid Northwest waters and treated at the Oregon Coast Aquarium in Newport is catching a ride back to California on a Coast Guard training flight.

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By Herp News

A sea turtle that was rescued from frigid Northwest waters and treated at the Oregon Coast Aquarium has caught a ride back to California on a Coast Guard training flight.

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By Herp News

Ester Mish’s husband gave her a pair of pythons for their wedding anniversary.

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By Herp News

Cadiz Inc. is pleased to announce today the permanent protection of up to 7,400 acres of its private land holdings through the establishment of the Fenner Valley Desert Tortoise Conservation Bank , in eastern San Bernardino County, California .

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By Herp News

Cadiz Inc. is pleased to announce today the permanent protection of up to 7,400 acres of its private land holdings through the establishment of the Fenner Valley Desert Tortoise Conservation Bank , in eastern San Bernardino County, California .

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Boa breeders around the U.S. can breath a sigh of relief today. An inaccurate report published last night in the Miami Herald set the stage for bad news, but today the USFWS has chosen not to list the boa constrictor as an invasive species at this time, choosing instead to only list reticulated pythons and three species of anaconda.

A press release issued today by the service stated:

“The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Service) today declared the reticulated python, DeSchauensee’s anaconda, green anaconda and Beni anaconda as “injurious” under the Lacey Act. A fifth snake, the boa constrictor, is removed from consideration for listing as an injurious wildlife species.

The listing will prohibit import of the four snakes into the United States and its territories, as well as transport across state lines for snakes already in the country, and is intended to help restrict the snakes’ spread in the wild. Following opportunities for public comment, an economic analysis and an environmental assessment, the Service produced the final rule, which is expected to publish in the Federal Register March 10. The prohibitions in the rule will go into effect 30 days after publication and apply to live individuals, gametes, viable eggs or hybrids of the four snakes.”

To read the complete press release, click here.

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By Herp News

Pakistani authorities are investigating after nearly two tonnes of freshwater turtle meat — a record haul taken from more than 4,000 animals — was seized from smugglers at Karachi port, officials said Friday. Customs officers last week foiled an attempt to smuggle 1.9 tonnes of turtle meat falsely labelled as fish meat to Hong Kong. “This is the biggest ever consignment of turtles seized in …

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No matter how often we see turtles eat, it never fails to bring a smile to our faces. Never stop dreaming the big dreams!

Submit your own reptile & amphibian videos at http://www.kingsnake.com/video/ and you could see them featured here or check out all the videos submitted by other users! …read more
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Give me five! At least it seems like that’s what this Bombina maxima is saying in this macro foot shot for our herp photo of the day, uploaded by kingsnake.com user Han!

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The US Fish & Wildlife Service will be adding boa constrictors, reticulated pythons, and anacondas to the invasive species restricted list, banning their import and interstate transport, reports the Miami Herald. On Friday, agency director Dan Ashe will make the announcement in Florida at at the Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge in Boynton Beach.

This is not likely to end the long fight between the USFWS and the reptile community, begun in 2006 when the ban was first proposed and the subject of an ongoing lawsuit by the United States Association of Reptile & Amphibian Keepers (USARK). While it is expected to impact the industry, many states will see legal local sales of restricted animals continue, so the overall impact is unclear.

For more information, check out the complete story at the Miami Herald.

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By Herp News

Family members managed to get the reptile off his arm and beat it to death.

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By Herp News

Family members managed to get the reptile off his arm and beat it to death.

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Alligators have a natural immunity to infection that could help humans combat bacterial illness.

From Bay News:

The government-funded study took place at the St. Augustine Alligator Farm Zoological Park over the past four years.

“Alligators live in a pretty inhospitable environment, “ said Barney Bishop, one of the lead researchers. “Many of them live in stagnant water where there is lots of bacteria. And while they are predators, they also eat carrion, so they must have a robust immune system to fend off infection in these situations.”

The researchers were able to isolate those infection-fighting peptides in the alligator blood. The hope is to use alligator blood as battlefield medicine. Soldiers wounded in battle are vulnerable to bacteria, such as MRSA. Alligators have a natural resistance.

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Known as the one hundred pacer to some, a graphic reference to the supposed efficacy of the venom (one bite and you’re dead in 100 paces or less!) and the snorkel-nosed viper to others, Deinagkistrodon acutus is one of the most recognizable and photogenic of the Asian snakes.

Having a light ground color, the dark triangular pattern is boldly evident–unless the snake is lying quietly coiled on a substrate of variably colored leaves. Then the camouflaging benefits of the pattern will be truly appreciated.

Adults of this oviparous crotaline may near a heavy bodied 5 feet in length. Hatchlings are a relatively slender 8 inches. A clutch typically numbers between 10 and 25 eggs, but up to 35 have been documented.

Prey items of this crepuscular and nocturnal snake include amphibians, small ground nesting or ground active birds and rodents.

Ranging over much of southern China and northern Vietnam, this taxon is of cultural significance in many areas, among which Taiwan is prominent.
Continue reading “The beautiful one hundred pace snake” …read more
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Known as the one hundred pacer to some, a graphic reference to the supposed efficacy of the venom (one bite and you’re dead in 100 paces or less!) and the snorkel-nosed viper to others, Deinagkistrodon acutus is one of the most recognizable and photogenic of the Asian snakes.

Having a light ground color, the dark triangular pattern is boldly evident–unless the snake is lying quietly coiled on a substrate of variably colored leaves. Then the camouflaging benefits of the pattern will be truly appreciated.

Adults of this oviparous crotaline may near a heavy bodied 5 feet in length. Hatchlings are a relatively slender 8 inches. A clutch typically numbers between 10 and 25 eggs, but up to 35 have been documented.

Prey items of this crepuscular and nocturnal snake include amphibians, small ground nesting or ground active birds and rodents.

Ranging over much of southern China and northern Vietnam, this taxon is of cultural significance in many areas, among which Taiwan is prominent.
Continue reading “The one hundred pace snake, an Asian beauty” …read more
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#ThrowbackThursday! Seadog, a gray tiger salamander, was 10 years old in 2008 when this photo was taken. In our herp photo of the day, Seadog proves that pets come in different shapes and sizes, uploaded by kingsnake.com user emajor!

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By Herp News

A pair of studies show that the deadly fungus Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis, responsible for the extinction of more than 200 amphibian species worldwide, has coexisted harmlessly with animals in Illinois and Korea for more than a century. The research will help biologists better understand the disease caused by Bd, chytridiomycosis, and the conditions under which it can be survived.

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By Herp News

The Tour de France is a long way from the Toronto Blue Jays' spring training clubhouse. Lizard Skins started selling cycling accessories such as handlebar grip tape back in 1993 and now distributes to 84 countries. The company says its bat grip tape combines softness and tackiness while reducing vibration. “It's gone like gangbusters,” said Canadian Brad Barker, who is Lizard Skins general …

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Get exactly the advertising exposure you need for less on the Internet’s oldest and most popular reptile and amphibian web community!

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The Business Package includes a total of 12 banner ads, three for each banner pool location on kingsnake.com. It also comes with a business directory listing on the front page of kingsnake.com, along with a link to your business’ website or social media page there and on the kingsnake.com classified index. Add an optional standard or enhanced classified account, and you’re ready to do business the way it should be done!

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By Herp News

There are likely less than 100 vaquita on the planet. Found only in the northern pocket of the Sea of Cortez in Mexico, the vaquita is a tiny, shy porpoise that has been brought to the very edge of extinction due to drowning in gillnets used for shrimping. But after years of stalling, Mexico now appears to be making a final effort to save the world’s most endangered cetacean.

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By Herp News

The Tour de France is a long way from the Toronto Blue Jays' spring training clubhouse. Lizard Skins started selling cycling accessories such as handlebar grip tape back in 1993 and now distributes to 84 countries. The company says its bat grip tape combines softness and tackiness while reducing vibration. “It's gone like gangbusters,” said Canadian Brad Barker, who is Lizard Skins general …

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Sometimes the key to healthy poison dart frog populations is a pig playing in the mud.
From BBC Earth:

Typically, female poison dart (dendrobatid) frogs lay eggs on land. Once the tadpoles hatch, male frogs, their fathers, then carry them to small nursery pools.

But these pools may be short-lived, and the frogs are too tiny to dig their own.

Enter the peccary, a species of wild pig common in Central and South America.

Peccaries like to fling turf, specifically by digging out wallows – their own individual mud spas.

As they do so, they can radically transform the rainforest floor, creating pools of water that are just the right size for prospective frog parents.

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Now that winter is almost over here in the South, and with it the wonderful mass migrations of all our Ambystomatid salamanders, it is now time to change gears and focus on another group of cool amphibians: Pseudacris!

Although this genus is not a salamander, these neat little frogs are out in full force right now.

Actually, the ornate chorus frog (Pseudacris ornata) have already been calling on warm nights since December. The mountain chorus frogs (Pseudacris brachyphona) are calling in Northeast Alabama, along with the upland chorus frogs (Pseudacris feriarum) and the southern chorus frogs (Pseudacris nigrita) down here.

A personal favorite of mine is is the spring eeper (Pseudacris crucifer crucifer). Not much is known about these secretive frogs because they are really rarely encountered outside of their breeding season, but during this time of the year any ditch, mudhole or low depression that holds water will serve as a breeding site for these small frogs. …read more
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Gotta love seeing a breeding group of gharials in our herp photo of the day, uploaded by kingsnake.com user Lucky 7!

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By Herp News

Turtle Bay Resort announced Tuesday the settlement of a lawsuit brought by Keep the North Shore Country challenging the City and County of Honolulu's acceptance of the Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement for the resort's proposed development plans. Full terms of the settlement were not released, but Turtle Bay Resort has agreed to make contributions toward the conservation of threatened …

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Planned for the Tottenham Hotspur football club, a new athletic facility has halted development because the land is home to great crested newts.

From the Irish Mirror:

“Surveys confirmed the presence of a medium-sized breeding population of great crested newt within the pond on site, and individual long-eared and common pipistrelle bats roosting in the agricultural buildings as well as the presence of grass snake on site.

“This being the case; the proposed development will result in the loss of a great crested newt breeding pond, confirmed bat roosts, amphibian/reptile suitable habitat and mature trees.”

It states that before planning permission can be granted the newts and bats must be “looked after” and that the club must “demonstrate that the favourable conservation status of the species will be maintained within the whole of the site”.

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It was late spring, in the Apalachicola National Forest (ANF) and I happened to have an hour to kill before meeting Kenny for a couple of days of herping. I was within a few miles of a favorite puddle, so decided to stop by for a hurried visit. During the winter this bit of water was a breeding site for ornate chorus frogs, I had seen a banded water snake or two there, and in previous years had seen a few mole salamanders beneath water edge logs.

But this time when I pulled up the site was unrecognizable. We had had an unusually wet winter and the rains had continued into the spring. The site, including the road-edge drainage ditch, was filled and overflowing with water. For a moment or two I contemplated whether I wanted to get wet just before leaving on a trip. But then a turtle surfaced in the flowing water of the ditch–a turtle with a narrow head and a prominently striped neck– an eastern chicken turtle, Deirochelys r. reticularia.

Unlike many of their semi-aquatic emydine stay-at-home relatives, the chicken turtles (3 subspecies) are known for their peregrinations. These turtles wander widely from flooded meadow to vernal pond to the still waters of canal edges. If things get uncomfortably dry they dig down and aestivate. And although I consider them one of the “everywhere and nowhere” turtles (meaning they are widespread but seldom readily seen), they are seen infrequently enough to consider each sighting a mini-event.

So now, if you have interpreted the last paragraph correctly, you know I wasn’t about to leave without at least trying to get some data from the chicken turtle. Yep. I got wet, but I was able to catch the turtle, a perfect example, an adult male. Hopefully he is still wandering, stopping now and again to sire more generations of wandering turtles. They are a delight to see.
Continue reading “Chicken turtles wander, but they aren’t lost” …read more
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This hatchling Gulf Coast spiny softshell gives us just enough of the “awwws” to make it through a Tuesday in our herp photo of the day, uploaded by kingsnake.com user gambusia!

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By Herp News

Tortoise Energy Infrastructure Corp. today announced that as of Feb. 28, 2015, the company’s unaudited total assets were approximately $4.2 billion and its unaudited ne

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By Herp News

Tortoise Energy Independence Fund, Inc. today announced that as of Feb. 28, 2015, the company’s unaudited total assets were approximately $383.7 million and its unaudit

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By Herp News

Tortoise Energy Independence Fund, Inc. today announced that as of Feb. 28, 2015, the company’s unaudited total assets were approximately $383.7 million and its unaudit

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By Herp News

Tortoise MLP Fund, Inc. today announced that as of Feb. 28, 2015, the company’s unaudited total assets were approximately $2.1 billion and its unaudited net asset value

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