By Herp News

Legless lizards evolved on five continents to burrow in loose soil and sand, but are rarely seen because they live underground. Hence the surprise when biologists found four new species in California, living in marginal areas like downtown Bakersfield, San Joaquin Valley oil fields and west of the runways at the airport. The discovery, which brings the number of species in the state to five, illustrates the undiscovered biodiversity around us.

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The Eastern Pacific hawksbill turtle (Eretmochelys imbricata), thought to be all but extinct, is making a comeback to Central America’s Gulf of Fonseca. How did it happen? No one knows.

From Fox News Latino:

The Eastern Pacific Hawksbill sea turtle was considered critically endangered until about seven years ago, with many scientists considering the species extinct.

Scientists have now discovered that the turtles are once again arriving in the Gulf of Fonseca, a large body of water in western Central America that is shared by Honduras, El Salvador and Nicaragua.

“We know the Eastern Pacific Hawksbill turtle is arriving in the Gulf of Fonseca, but we do not know why, nor do we know if its life cycle has changed – if a large number stay in the gulf – or if it is due to food, nesting or even why they live here,” [Honduran Natural Resources and Environment Secretariat director of biodiversity Rafael Amaro] Garcia said.

Climate change is one possible cause of the resurgence of the sea turtle population. Read more here.

Photo: An Indo-Pacific hawksbill sea turtle. …read more
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By Herp News

PHOENIX – They may be small, slow and even cute for now, but within a few weeks, the baby Nile crocodiles that fit in Russ Johnson’s hands will be downright dangerous.

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By Herp News

Everyone knows that tigers, pandas, and blue whales are threatened with extinction—but lions!? Researchers were shocked to recently discover that lion populations have fallen precipitously: down to around 30,000 animals across the African continent. While 30,000 may sound like a lot, this is a nearly 70 percent decline since 1960. In addition, lion populations are increasingly fragmented with a number of populations having vanished altogether. However, there is hope: one place where lion populations are actually on the rise is Niassa National Reserve in Mozambique. Here, lion populations have risen by around 60 percent in just seven years. In part this is due to the effort of Colleen and Keith Begg.

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I might be getting a Misissipi map turtle soon! I’m very excited but I don’t know what to name it! Please give me any name suggestions that you think are good, although I don’t want any names named after the ninja turtles, or something like Shelly, squirtle or yertle! I hope that Ocean and Prince (the names of my current res turtles) like the new turtle! Are there any things that Misissipi map turtles prefer? Will all of them get along well? The new turtle is probably going to be around the same age s my current turtles; about 8 months. Please reply as much information (and names) as you can! …read more
Read more here: Turtle Times

Fungal threats to honeybees and bats have been in the news lately, but they’re not the only species at risk from these human-spread diseases. Snakes and amphibians, too, are facing catastrophic effects from these emerging pathogens.

From the Washington Post:

They are fungi, and they arrived in the United States from overseas with an assist from humans — through travel and trade. They prefer cold conditions and kill with precision, so efficiently that they’re creating a crisis in the wild.

The death toll on amphibians, bats and snakes from fungi represents “potential extinction events,” said [Dr. Jeremy] Coleman, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife research biologist who coordinates the government’s response to the bat-killing infection known as white-nose syndrome. It’s so large, he said, that it can’t be measured “as far as numbers of dead organisms,” and is “decimating populations as we know them.”

Read more here.

Photo: USFWS …read more
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By Herp News

Gather round, everyone, young and old. In an impressive stunt sure to amaze and delight the family, Houdini the African spurred tortoise disappeared from his owner’s yard last week on Cape Cod only to appear five days later, unharmed, having trekked the distance of nearly 4 miles.

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By Herp News

Gather round, everyone, young and old. In an impressive stunt sure to amaze and delight the family, Houdini the African spurred tortoise disappeared from his owner’s yard last week on Cape Cod only to appear five days later, unharmed, having trekked the distance of nearly 4 miles.        

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By Herp News

Gather round, everyone, young and old. In an impressive stunt sure to amaze and delight the family, Houdini the African spurred tortoise disappeared from his owner’s yard last week on Cape Cod only to appear five days later, unharmed, having trekked the distance of nearly 4 miles.        

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By Herp News

Staff members at the Turtle Hospital report that denture glue is successfully holding together 40-pound sea turtle's shell

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By Herp News

Staff members at the Turtle Hospital report that denture glue is successfully holding together 40-pound sea turtle's shell

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By Herp News

Gather round, everyone, young and old. In an impressive stunt sure to amaze and delight the family, Houdini the African spurred tortoise disappeared from his owner’s yard last week on Cape Cod only to appear five days later, unharmed, having trekked the distance of — yes folks! — nearly four miles.        

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My turtles love to eat and I feel like I’m not feeding them enough of a variety. I feed them bokchoy, lettuce, reptomin, grapes, strawberries, plum, raspberries, carrots, shrimp, fish, mosquito larvae, bloodworms and I’m going to try kale. Any ideas for a different variety of foods?
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By Herp News

The blobfish (Psychrolutes marcidus), a species that lives at great depths and is rarely seen but resembles a marine Jabba the Hut, has been voted the world’s ugliest animal.

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By Herp News

The Western Ghats are a globally recognized repository of biological diversity for our planet. We know very little about most species found here, particularly the ecologically sensitive and spectacularly beautiful 179 amphibians. Astonishingly, 87% of all Western Ghats frogs are endemic and found nowhere else on the planet. Our collaborative research project with Drs Paul Robbins and Ashwini Chhatre examining biodiversity in production landscapes of Ghats unearthed some spectacular amphibians in 2013.

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By Herp News

KRISTEN BUTLER, UPI.com Amazonian butterflies drink turtle tears in a salt-scarce region of the rainforest.

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My res turtles wont eat green vegetables! I’ve tried lettuce and bokchoy but all they do is stare at it and ask for reptomin or meat or fruit. I’ve tried feeding them greens first in their meal, but they dont like greens. Can you please suggest some greens that they might like? Also, how can I get them to eat their vegetables? I’ve tried giving them carrot and they ate it, its like they dont like the colour green! Please help! …read more
Read more here: Turtle Times

Check out this video “Female Nosy Faly Delivery,” submitted by kingsnake.com user 1Sun.
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

Once nearly eaten out of existence, the green sea turtle is in the midst of a record nesting boom from South Florida to South Carolina

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I have 2 RES turtles and whenever i com near them when they are basking they jump in the water, also they always try to escape. I always feed them when they are hungry, when i handle them i am gentle. I have had them for about 2 months, how can i get them to love me?I love them alot! One of them is a female and one of them is a male, they are roughly 8 months old, I think. I always watch them swim and all they do is try to escape and look up at me for food. Please help!!!! …read more
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Trevor has been developing dark spots on his shell and they do not seem to be coming in any patterns. Anyone?
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By Herp News

What was that lizard on the side of the Humble City Cafe? Or how about that turtle in Bear Branch? Or that snake in the median on Kingwood Dr? Want to find out? Of course you do.

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By Herp News

In a 2010 episode of his Animal Planet series “Wild Recon,” self-proclaimed reptile expert Donald Schultz told viewers that he planned to track down an Iranian desert monitor lizard — an endangered species he described as the Holy Grail of monitors, offered the same level of protection as pandas.

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By Herp News

A turtle rehab center in Florida turned to an unlikely substance to repair a sea turtle’s fractured shell: denture glue. Bette Zirkelbach, manager of the Turtle Hospital in Marathon, Fla., was initially stumped when someone brought in a 40-pound sea turtle suffering from a fractured…        

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By Herp News

What was that lizard on the side of the Humble City Cafe? Or how about that turtle in Bear Branch? Or that snake in the median on Kingwood Dr? Want to find out? Of course you do.

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In what has to be the dreamiest, most romantic reptile-related news story, ever, scientists report that Amazonian butterlifes drink the tears of turtles.

From LiveScience.com:

The sight of butterflies flocking onto the heads of yellow-spotted river turtles in the western Amazon rain forest is not uncommon, at least if one is able to sneak up on the skittish reptiles. But the reason why butterflies congregate onto the turtles may be stranger than you think: to drink their tears.

The butterflies are likely attracted to the turtles’ tears because the liquid drops contain salt, specifically sodium, an important mineral that is scant in the western Amazon, said Phil Torres, a scientist who does much of his research at the Tambopata Research Center in Peru and is associated with Rice University.

Unlike butterflies, turtles get plenty of sodium through their largely carnivorous diet.

Read the rest here.

Photo: Jeff Cremer / Perunature.com …read more
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By Herp News

A 650-pound female leatherback sea turtle was found stranded in a marsh by Sandy Neck Beach in Barnstable Wednesday morning, and, after a medical checkup, was ushered back out into the ocean.        

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By Herp News

LEDYARD, Conn. (AP) — A monitor lizard that repeatedly startled residents of this rural Connecticut town before it was killed by police last month was apparently a pet that escaped from its owner's property, police said Thursday.        

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By Herp News

Dentist uses denture repair adhesive to help fix endangered sea turtle's shell in Florida Keys        

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By Herp News

A Ledyard man illegally owned a monitor lizard that had roamed the eastern part of town and was shot by police last month, police said.

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By Herp News

An 800-pound female leatherback sea turtle was found stranded in a marsh by Sandy Neck Beach in Barnstable Wednesday morning, and, after a medical checkup, was ushered back out into the ocean.        

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By Herp News

LEDYARD, Conn. (AP) — Ledyard police say they have tracked down the owner of a large reptile that was shot and killed in town last month.        

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By Herp News

LEDYARD — Police have charged a local man with illegal possession of a reptile after determining it was his 4-foot-long Nile Monitor Lizard that was helping itself to the residents of a chicken coop on Aug. 25.        

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By Herp News

A recent study of forest in East Kalimantan, Borneo has found that orangutans travel on the ground far more often than expected. The study, published in the American Journal of Primatology, was carried out in Wehea Forest involving the use of 78 camera traps across 38 square kilometres of forest.

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By Herp News

Africa’s elephant poaching crisis doesn’t just threaten a species, but imperils one of humanity’s most important links to the natural world and even our collective sanity, according to acclaimed photographers and film-makers, Cyril Christo and Marie Wilkinson. Authors of the book Walking Thunder – In the Footsteps of the African Elephant, Christo and Wilkinson have been documenting Africa’s titans in photos and film for several years. In 2011, the pair released a film Lysander’s Song (named after their son an avid fan of elephants) which depicts the millennial-old relationship between humans and elephants.

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By Herp News

The sight of butterflies flocking onto the heads of yellow-spotted river turtles in the western Amazon rain forest is not uncommon, at least if one is able to sneak up on the skittish reptiles. But the reason why butterflies congregate onto the turtles may be stranger than you think: to drink their tears.

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Is the Prairie rattlesnake (Crotalus Viridis) losing his rattle?

Terry Phillip, a naturalist at Reptile Gardens in Rapid City, thinks so. Check out this audio clip and transcript of an NPR story and tell us if you agree.

Photo by kingsnake.com user DKT. …read more
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By Herp News

Mayor Adam Forgie said that in order to fix the problems in the borough of 6,400 people, he needs to see them.

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By Herp News

A unique new fossil discovered in Jordan has given researchers fresh insight about a prehistoric sea lizard called prognathodon, as it is the first fossil to show the shape of the lizard's tale, suggesting that it swam like a shark. … Continue reading →

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By Herp News

It was a lizard with a shark-like fin. That’s what Swedish researchers have discovered about the fearsome mosasaur Prognathodon, which lived in the seas of the Cretaceous Period about 70 million years ago. The discovery was based on a fossil found in Jordan in 2008. Researcher Johan Lindgren, of Lund University in Sweden, travelled to Jordan in 2011 and discovered that imprints of soft tissue …

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