By Herp News
An endangered leatherback turtle was saved after being speared by a swordfish, with the help of a Halifax-based sea turtle rescue group. Kathleen Martin, executive director and co-founder of the Canadian Sea Turtle Network, was in Trinidad last week looking for leatherback turtles previously tagged in Canadian waters. Martin and her group were attempting to attach a satellite tag to the animals …
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How did the deadly fungus chytridiomycosis get so entrenched that it may cost us every frog on earth? We weren’t paying attention.
From Scientific American:
The best way to prevent a disease from turning into an epidemic is to closely monitor its development and put systems in place before it starts spreading rapidly through populations. This requires surveillance and monitoring of the disease and disease populations. This is fine for populations of livestock, or humans, but tends to be a neglected area when it comes to animals in the wild. There are plenty of examples of devastating diseases that have ranged through wild-animal populations relatively unchecked until the later stages as they were simply not caught early enough.
An example is the fungal skin infection of frogs (chytridiomycosis) which absolutely decimated amphibians, wiping out about 200 frog species world wide. Yet investigations into the disease didn’t start until 15 years after its initial appearance.
Photo: Scientific American …read more
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By Herp News
Dozens of children, along with parents, grandparents, caregivers and friends, gathered in the children's portion of the library to kick off the 2014 Summer Reading Program with a display of reptiles.
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By Herp News
Musician Billy Joel has weighed in on the ivory bill making its way through the New York State legislature.
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By Herp News
Mote Marine volunteers rescue the loggerhead on Longboat Key.
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There has to be an easier way to make a living than putting a venomous snake in your mouth.
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By Herp News
KUALA TERENGGANU: The World Wildlife Fund of Malaysia will sign a memorandum of understanding (MoU) against the consumption of turtle’s eggs with the Tourism and Cultural Ministry this Saturday.
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By Herp News
A camera trap program in Ecuador’s embattled Yasuni National Program has struck gold, taking what researchers believe is the first ever film of a wild nocturnal curassow (Nothocrax urumutum). In addition, the program has captured video of other rarely-seen animals, including the short-eared dog and the giant armadillo.
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Scientists have discovered fossilized tracks on ancient sea beds, allowing them to figure out how now-extinct sea reptiles swam.
From the International Business Times:
The scientists said in a new study, published in the journal Nature Communications on Wednesday, that during the Mesozoic era, about 252 to 66 million years ago, the seas were full of reptiles like the nothosaur. While scientists knew that these creatures were predators with long bodies and paddle-like limbs, exactly how they used their limbs to propel themselves through water was unknown. Now, recently discovered trackways on an ancient seabed in Yunnan province in southwestern China, have helped scientists find an answer.
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By Herp News
A PET store is holding a reptile workshop in store for curious customers.
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By Herp News
A two-decade legal fight to protect a squat lizard with dragon-like head spines from urban encroachment in Southern California took a new turn this week.
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By Herp News
It took almost two weeks, but in the end a tortoise that disappeared from its Mount Pearl home has returned, safe and sound.
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By Herp News
Who's number one? According to the travel website Tripflip.com Reptile Gardens in Rapid City sits on top! Public relations director John Brockelsby said he received an email saying that the travel website ranked our popular local tourist attraction the #1 place to visit in South Dakota.
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By Herp News
And based on what many soccer experts are saying, he seems to have made the right choice. Brazil is simply too good to drop its opening game on home turf
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By Herp News
It's not something you expect to see in your front yard — a large snapping turtle, laying eggs. But that's what Wayne Irwin encountered recently at his home near Rathwell, along the Assiniboine River in southern Manitoba.
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In losing Carl Koch, the herp world has lost a friend. And so have I.
Back many years ago, when I had but one lone iguana, I, like many of us, began frequenting my local reptile friendly pet store. At the time for me, it was Pets N Things in Cudahy, Wisc. Every Friday I would find myself at the store at the same time as a local reptile guy named Carl. He saw that I actually wanted to learn more and introduced me to herp societies, books and, importantly to my future, kingsnake.com.
Carl was an avid field herper and educator in Wisconsin. He worked with the State of Wisconsin on a variety of field studiesm including most recently Butler’s gartersnake population surveys. Carl spent as much time as he could field herping.
Over the years, Carl and I became friends. I still went to him for advice on captive care, called him when I knew an animal that hit my rescue might interest him, and invited him to help me at my many educational events. I relied on him as a friend and as a mentor. When I finally started field herping, I reached out to Carl to show me the way. He graciously opened his schedule to take me and a friend looking for timber rattlesnakes, even though the weather was all wrong. We were skunked that day reptile-wise, but we all became better friends.
Last year, when I wanted to actively start herping, I reached out to Carl. I asked for advice, locations, even more advice. Carl had a magic in the field. It is where his passion thrived and where he found great peace. For Carl, who suffered from anxiety and severe depression, that peace was greatly needed. Carl’s widow would like everyone suffering to know that if you are suffering, please reach out to friends and family.
Carl leaves behind his wife Stacy and their two daughters. I will be honoring his memory and all he did for me over the years by ensuring that his reptile pets are taken care of. His friends have already lined up to help.
This weekend as you head out to herp, take a moment to think of a man who helped turn this deli cupper into a full fledged herper.
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By Herp News
A PET store is holding a reptile workshop in store for curious customers.
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By Herp News
Keystone Reptile Club president Bill Wheeler Jr. holds a 42-inch Black Rat Snake entered into the Sinnemahoning Snake Hunt competition on Saturday afternoon in Cameron County. The snake hunt was held on Saturday and Sunday.
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By Herp News
A new species of wolf snake has been discovered in the Cardamom Mountains of southeast Cambodia.
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By Herp News
The Galveston island nest was found on Sunny Beach, “right smack dab in the middle of the parking lot,” said Kimberly Reich, sea turtle research lab director at Texas A&M University at Galveston. […] a volunteer secured the nest from that possibility, and Reich and A&M personnel packed the freshly laid eggs for shipment to a hatcher on Padre Island National Seashore run by Donna Shaver, chief …
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By Herp News
Beachfront businesses and residents have until March 1 to comply Matia Veniero pulls down her shades at night — all to help save the baby turtles, she says.
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By Herp News
Over the last two months, poachers have killed 68 African elephants in Garamba National Park representing around four percent of the population. Poachers have used helicopters, grenades, and chainsaws to undertake their gruesome trade, and, for the first time, the park has recorded that the criminals are removing the elephant’s brains in addition to tusks and genitals.
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By Herp News
Museum to feature crowd-curated exhibit and lead tours of bridge.
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By Herp News
Byline: The Lizard’s Tamar class all-weather lifeboat Rose launched in the early hours of this morning to assist a fishing vessel with 3 people onboard that had suffered difficulties with its propulsion system 16 miles south-east of the Lizard lifeboat station. Page Content: The Lizard lifeboat was asked by Falmouth Coastguard to launch at 1:30am this morning to assist the Brixham Scalloper …
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By Herp News
The Town of Turtle Parade is always a highlight of the annual festival held in the township. This year, the Turtle Fourth of July celebration will be held June 27 – 29.
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By Herp News
Exit 13 on Shaikh Zayed Road en route to Abu Dhabi — past Ibn Batuta mall, past the Emarat petrol station, past the Etisalat power grid on the left — takes you to a stretch of road that had no other cars on it.
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By Herp News
SAN DIEGO, June 12, 2014 /PRNewswire/ – Turtle Beach Corporation (NASDAQ: HEAR), a leading audio technology innovator, today announced that its line of HyperSound directed audio speakers will be showcased …
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By Herp News
1. DelandReptiDay Deland Reptile & Exotic Animal Festival, Saturday, 3150 E. New York Ave. This one-day event features vendors offering reptile pets, supplies, feeders, cages and merchandise, as well as seminars and door prizes.
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By Herp News
A woman who 'gave birth' to a lizard has been threatened by an angry lynch mob who accused her of witchcraft. Debi Nubatonis, 31, gave birth to the gecko after an eight-month pregnancy and now Indonesian officials are sending in an exert team to clear up the mystery.
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Check out this video “How to find snakes,” submitted by kingsnake.com user smetlogik.
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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By Herp News
As an environmental journalist covering stories from the great Arctic ice melt to the rhino poaching crisis in Africa, you’ll forgive me if sometimes in the morning—before I turn my computer on—I have a sudden desire to spend a few extra minutes in bed or have a leisurely breakfast with my daughter or just sit in the back yard with a cup of tea and a good book.
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By Herp News
On opposite sides of the globe over millions of years, the snakes of North America and Australia independently evolved similar body types that helped them move and capture prey more efficiently. Snakes on both continents include stout-bodied, highly camouflaged ambush predators, such as rattlesnakes in North America and death adders in Australia. There are slender, fast-moving foragers on both continents, as well as small burrowing snakes. This independent evolution of similar body forms in response to analogous ecological conditions is a striking example of a phenomenon called convergence.
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By Herp News
It took seven editors and 26 authors nine years to compile the first ever Reptile Atlas for all reptiles found in the southern tip of Africa. This huge collaborative effort resulted in the 485-page Atlas and Red List of the Reptiles of South Africa, Lesotho and Swaziland – a hardcover book launched recently that also contains the conservation status of the 421 recognised species and subspecies …
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By Herp News
A team of archaeologists in Guatemala has discovered a council house dating back about 700 years with altars, incense burners and sculpted images of animals. Located at the site of Nixtun-Ch'ich' in Petén, Guatemala, the house has “two colonnaded halls constructed side by side. The halls were decorated with sculpted [reptile], parrot and turtle imagery,” writes Timothy Pugh, a professor at …
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Should the wood frog, Rana sylvatica, be the official amphibian of New York State? Nine-year-old Lili Winkelman thinks so, and Sen. John DeFrancisco wants to make it law.
From the Democrat & Chronicle:
Like several of the state’s recognized symbols, the beginnings of the wood frog push came in an elementary school classroom. Sen. John DeFrancisco, R-Syracuse, first introduced the bill last year after 9-year-old Lili Winkelman, a Skaneateles fourth-grader, wrote to him with the idea.
“You probably don’t know this, but the wood frog is already the unofficial amphibian of the state,” DeFrancisco said on the Senate floor. “A young girl in that class, Lili Winkelman, thought, why is that? She loves frogs. Why should it be unofficial?”
Winkelman followed up the letter with a 4 -1/2-minute YouTube video in January, in which she spoke about the unique qualities of the amphibian as photos of the frog float above her right shoulder — not unlike a television news anchor. Each of her classmates at Skaneateles’ State Street Intermediate School followed up with a letter, DeFrancisco said.
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By Herp News
In a surprise announcement, British oil company Soco International has said it will suspend exploratory operations in Virunga National Park, home to half the world’s Critically Endangered mountain gorillas as well as thousands of other species. The announcement follows several years of campaigning from conservation groups led by WWF.
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By Herp News
In a surprise announcement, British oil company Soco International has said it will suspend exploratory operations in Virunga National Park, home to half the world’s Critically Endangered mountain gorillas as well as thousands of other species. The announcement follows several years of campaigning from conservation groups led by WWF.
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By Herp News
In 1890 Lamberto Loria collected 45 specimens—all female—of a small bat from the wilds of Papua New Guinea. Nearly 25 years later, in 1914, the species was finally described and named by British zoologist Oldfield Thomas, who dubbed it the New Guinea big-eared bat (Pharotis imogene) after its massive ears. But no one ever saw the bat again.
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By Herp News
In 1890 Lamberto Loria collected 45 specimens—all female—of a small bat from the wilds of Papua New Guinea. Nearly 25 years later, in 1914, the species was finally described and named by British zoologist Oldfield Thomas, who dubbed it the New Guinea big-eared bat (Pharotis imogene) after its massive ears. But no one ever saw the bat again.
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Can the native species of the ecological treasure that is the Galapagos really be protected from invasive species?
Laura Santoso of the California Institute of Technology takes a thoughtful, in-depth look at the issues and conflicting interests in Wired Science:
Even with unlimited cash, it seems impossible to eradicate certain intruders without also harming native species. Small but pervasive species, like rats, are extremely difficult to target without catching resident wildlife in the crossfire. In 2012, 22 tons of rat bait were dropped by helicopter on Pinzon island, blanketing 7 square miles with little blue poisonous cubes. Several organizations, including the Galapagos National Park and CDF, supported the move because the rats had been devouring the eggs of native giant tortoises and lava lizards. But the “raticide” sparked significant controversy, imperiling neighboring native species like the Galapagos hawks. While pesticides are often the best available option (biological interventions are technically challenging to develop), they cannot suppress invasive species without causing side effects.
The final piece of the puzzle, after thwarting new invasive species and removing existing ones, is actively helping endemic species recover. Some local fauna, like the tortoise and the mangrove finch, have been so decimated that they may be destined for extinction without significant help. On the other hand, Giant Tortoise rehabilitation is one example of seemingly productive human intervention. When tortoise populations had dwindled from thousands to dozens on some islands in the 1960s, they were taken in by humans and bred in captivity. Repatriation projects on Santa Cruz, Isabela, and Espanola have increased total tortoise populations to 26,000, but the current dependence on human assistance sparks questions about whether the intervention itself is unnatural, or unsustainable. Although the repatriated tortoises have begun to mate by themselves in the wild, it is unclear if they can maintain their numbers once captive breeding stops.
Photo: kingsnake.com user Ivory Tortoise …read more
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