From snake-bite kits to suction tubes, everyone always has some fail-safe method said to stop the spread of venom. Recently someone hit up The Straight Dope with a new addition: fire. No, his name was not Beavis.

Dear Cecil:
There’s a common belief that "sucking the poison out" is an effective snakebite remedy. I also heard journalist Stephanie Nolen talk about a man in Sudan who set his foot on fire after a snake bite, which he claimed saved him from the poison. Is either of these treatments effective? — Dyer

Cecil replies:

I treasure questions like yours, Dyer, because of the insight they give me into the human mind. Ninety-nine out of a hundred people, on hearing about some birdbrain who sets himself on fire to combat snakebite, think: what an amusing anecdote. Then there’s you, solemnly wondering: is this something I should try?

Quick answer: no. However, I don’t mean to make sport of you, for this simple reason. Although the Sudanese fellow’s grasp of the fine points left a lot to be desired, the therapeutic regimen to which he evidently subscribed was the standard treatment for snakebite for more than 2,500 years. It involved both suction and cauterization, which of course is the sober medical term for setting part of yourself (or someone) ablaze. We’ll refer to this overall approach as the suction method. Minus some of its more alarming features, it appeared in the Boy Scout manual until at least 1963.

Cecil actually goes into great detail on a lot of different methods, and it is an amusing blog post. My snake bite kit involves a cell phone and the telephone numbers of the Kentucky Reptile Zoo and the Florida Snakebite Institute. That is all I will ever need, no matter where I am in the world.

Inset photo courtesy of Terry Phillip.

An endangered Kemp's Ridley sea turtle named "Johnny Vasco da Gama" made his way back to the Gulf after three years and an exceptionally long journey. Found in the Netherlands, he was rehabbed in Portugal and just finished his final leg of rehabilition at Mote Marine Laboratory in Sarasota before being released into the Gulf waters he was from. TampaBay.com reports:

The Kemp's ridley turtle was rescued in November 2008 in the Netherlands. The turtle was stabilized by the Rotterdam Zoo in the Netherlands and sent to the aquarium Oceanário de Lisboa in Portugal the following summer and was transferred to Zoomarine for rehab.

Zoomarine staff identified the turtle as a juvenile Kemp's ridley — a highly endangered species that spends this part of its life feeding in relatively shallow, warm waters of the western North Atlantic, particularly in the Gulf of Mexico, which is thousands of miles from where it was rescued. To return the turtle to optimum habitat, Zoomarine staff worked with NOAA Fisheries Service, FWC and Mote to obtain special import and export permits and arrange for the turtle's journey to Florida.

Sea turtles in Phuket are moving their normal nesting areas and have deserted a few of their normal lay spots. From the Phuket Gazette:

“Unfortunately, the turtles are not laying eggs on the usual beaches even though it is the nesting season,” (Kongkiat Kittiwattanawong, head of the Marine Endangered Species Unit at the Phuket Marine Biological Center) said.

The number of Leatherback, Olive Ridley and Green turtles are lower than before, a worried Mr Kongkiat explained.

“Climate is a major factor. It determines turtle population size as well as affecting the gender of the turtle’s offspring. The optimum temperature [for turtle nesting] is 29°C. If it’s too hot they won’t lay eggs,” he said.

An officer stationed at the Khao Lampi – Hat Thai Mueang National Park, in Phang Nga, also confirmed that no turtles had laid eggs on the beach this year.

The Black Sea turtles are returning to the Baja Coast. From Huff Post:

Every expedition begins well before the official start and ends far after its conclusion. This is especially the case with The Black Turtle Project, an unfolding and evolving effort to join conservation photography, communication and biology. I can assure you that this project began long ago and will live on into the future. The past two weeks in Baja are just the start of a collaborative effort that will transpire over the coming year and document the nascent and emerging success story of the black sea turtle's return to the Pacific coast of the Americas.

The bad news? Poachers are returning as well. To try to ward off poachers, the Madagascar-based Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust is defacing the shells of turtles to prevent theft. They explain their reasoning in this BBC video.

Recently a Fox News poll about keeping exotic pets began circulating around Facebook.

"Stop the animal rights extremists, and vote!" was the cry from the reptile community.

While organized opposition from animal rights extremists to the keeping of reptiles as pets is a definite political problem, the most powerful way we can fight back is on a very personal level.

Unless the average person knows someone who keeps reptiles, they have no understanding of why we keep these animals. They don't understand the joy we get out of our pets, and the happiness that having these animals gives to us.

And because they have no understanding of why we keep these animals, they are fertile ground for negative messages about reptile keeping.

If we want to protect our right to share our lives with these amazing animals, we have to take that advantage away from our enemies. We need to reach out to the people who don't understand us and our pets. We need to share our love of our animals in ways they'll understand and relate to.

For me, I enjoy keeping pretty things, like my carpet pythons with their vibrant colors. I enjoy watching the animals blossom and grow under my care. I enjoy the daily interactions I have with my iguana Osama Binguana, who is notorious for seeking out my attention. I enjoy working on target training with my iguanas as well. I can't train them to sit and roll over, but I can train them to go where I want with food rewards.

All these things are concepts every pet owner can relate to, even if they have no interest in pets who aren't furry and cute. That's why I spend at least 30 hours a month doing outreach.

I am at schools and libraries, pet stores and Scout meetings, as well as at general pet events. You know, the kind where dog and cat people go? So do I. And I explain what goes into caring for the ball python. Why certain animals do not make great pets, and what it takes to keep them if you are interested.

I explain the legalities of keeping reptiles, and what people need to do to be responsible keepers. I am not above correcting bad knowledge, and challenging existing keepers to improve their habits, or telling them what they need to know to be a better keeper and a better representative of the reptile community. One bad apple can ruin a bunch -- and change public perception in a heart beat. I'm there to try to keep that from happening.

For those who know me or have met me, I am a brash, tattooed metalhead. None of that is present in my public persona representing the community. My tattoos are covered, my make-up is demure, and my language is family-friendly. My clothes are neat and pressed, and I have a spare shirt or two packed for changes in case I get pooped on. My animals are freshly washed the morning of the event, and only my most trustworthy are displayed.

When dealing with the "I saw on Animal Planet..." tales, I say, "There are always some people who are into things for the wrong reasons. People do bad things in every walk of life, and it is no different in the pet community. Look at Michael Vick." That's something dog and cat owners understand.

It's great but not enough to work paid jobs at zoos, or doing paid educational events with your animals at birthday parties. It isn't enough to present at a herp society or reptile group, or to get together at your local show and talk about reptiles.

We need to reach a broader audience. We need to reach the people who will look at your snake and crinkle their faces with an "euwwww" response, and get past that to the common ground we share. We also need to help them see how responsibly keeping these animals benefits and protects wild populations.

This is why I challenge every single keeper to donate at least four hours of free reptile education to the general public in 2012.

Contact your local library and ask if you can come in on a Saturday with a presentation.

Contact your local pet shop and ask if you can set up a reptile display.

Reach out to local Scout groups.

Don't just huddle with people who share your views at reptile shows; try to make a positive change on the perception of our beloved pets with people who don't share them yet.

I personally average 30 hours a month, doing free education in environments where people may not really expect to see reptiles. I challenge you to only four hours in a whole year.

This will not make the animal rights extremists back off, but it will make their audience more informed and less receptive to their distortions. Rather than falling on the ears of people who have no experience with a reptile keeper, it will fall on those of someone who has heard from us, who has seen the love and care we have for our animals, who may not want to keep reptiles themselves, but at least gets that we're not criminals and freaks, but pet lovers like them.

Will you rise to the challenge, or will you let the enemies of us and of our animals have the first, last, and only word?

A new amphibian was recently discovered in the Western Ghats. From the Times of India:

The new species, Ichthyophis davidi, a yellow striped caecilian according to him, has been discovered from the Belgaum district of Karnataka, which is part of the Western Ghat.
The new species Ichthyophis davidi is one of the largest known yellow striped caecilians from Western Ghats and is named in honour of David Gower, Department of Zoology, The Natural History Museum, London, in recognition of his contributions to Indian caecilian studies, he said.

[....]

Western Ghats, one of the global biodiversity ‘hot spots’, support 25 species of legless amphibians (the caecilians). Among the 25 species, only 5 are yellow striped forms, which are limited in distribution. He said that the members of the team had also discovered a few other new species of amphibians from the region earlier.

For those species of amphibians trying to find that perfect partner, distance may be the issue. Thankfully Amphibian Ark is coming to the rescue!

A new initiative by the conservation group, Amphibian Ark, hopes to match lonely, vanishing frogs with a prince/princess to to save them. Dubbed FrogMatchMaker.com after online dating sites, the program is working to connect supporters and donors with amphibian conservation programs in need. Currently, amphibians are among the world's most imperiled species with 41 percent threatened with extinction according to the IUCN Red list.

"This website currently includes 48 projects in 23 countries on three continents and can be searched by country, region, species, funding amount required, and by project type," explains Kevin Johnson, Amphibian Ark Communications Officer, in a press release. "You can also browse new projects that have been added in the last 30 days or projects that have been added in the last 60 days. Using FrogMatchMaker.com, donors have been able to easily locate amphibian conservation projects that are a good match with their organizations’ missions, and provide appropriate support, to ensure the success of these vital programs."

To read the full article, or participate in the program, click here.

From all of us at kingsnake.com, Merry Christmas. Have a safe holiday weekend!



Photo courtesy of Wolfgang Wuster

The Crocodile and Recreation Park in Ayer Keroh has lost more than 50 crocodiles due to visitors littering the enclosures with non-degradable trash.

From the New Straits Times:

"In most cases, post-mortems revealed that the reptiles had died of severe lung inflammation, which was caused by consumption of plastic bags," he told the New Straits Times at the park yesterday.

Amran said in several cases, plastic bags were found in the stomach of dead crocodiles.

"We have come across a lot of rubbish being thrown by visitors... food containers, water bottles, plastic bags, clothing, slippers and even diapers. The more visitors we have, the more rubbish we would collect in the pools at the end of the day.

"From our experience, visitors would usually throw things into the pool to make the crocodiles move as they lie motionless."

He said visitors continued to throw litter at the reptiles despite the presence of signboards warning them not to do so.

This is an issue world-wide and species-wide. In my travels I have seen a variety of signs trying to discourage this behavior. If you happen to be somewhere and see someone preparing to do this, stand up and stop them.

It's been a few months since the fire that destroyed the Pro Exotics snake facility owned by Robyn Markland and Chad Brown. The tragedy shook the entire reptile community this fall, so I thought I would check in with Robyn Markland and see how he, Chad and the company were doing.

With a new perspective on life, Robyn and Chad have remained amazingly optimistic during the ordeal of loosing all their snakes and facing the clean-up and rebuild.

Click here to hear the interview with Robyn.

To see the recently upload fire pics, click here.

And to get one of the last "WTS Dwayne" shirts, click here.

Just like Jello, jellyfish jiggle and wiggle. And that just may be the key to the increase in Florida's Leatherback Turtle population.

The largest of the marine reptiles, leatherbacks used to be rare visitors to Florida shores. But over the past two decades, the number of nests dug at Florida beaches has been increasing. This year's count is 600 nests, one of the highest ever at beaches tracked for long-term trends. Nest counts are the main method of assessing sea-turtle population trends.

This success story of sea-turtle conservation has a possible twist, said Kelly Stewart, a researcher with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. When jellyfish are abundant, the leatherbacks have a veritable feast, which could help the female turtles reproduce more often.

"Jellyfish, and any gelatinous species, are the preferred food source for leatherback sea turtles," said Stewart, who completed her doctoral thesis at Duke University on these turtle trends. "So, if there are more jellyfish, that may not be good for people, but is good for the leatherbacks."

Jellyfish aren't really fish but gelatinous creatures related to corals. There are more than 1,000 species around the world, and they have a familiar, umbrella-like body and tentacles. Most have the ability to sting their prey, but their main predators, such as leatherback turtles, seem to be immune to the venom.

In recent years, there have been giant blooms around the world, including several cases involving a jellyfish species that is foreign to an area. Cocoa Beach had such a phenomenon over the Memorial Day weekend with an invasion of mauve stingers, a deep ocean jellyfish that is rare in Florida but common in the Mediterranean.

To read the full article, click here.

It would make a great new superhero, but Citizen Scientists are people like you and I. In fact I would venture to say every single field herp is a citizen scientist. The changes they are making international are impressive, but these are people just following their hearts.

Dr Ceaser Sengupta, a pathologist and General Manager with what's considered to be the world's largest thyroid testing laboratory, Thyrocare Technologies Limited, leads a busy life. When he's not at his Turbhe office, his attention is divided between his six year-old daughter, his father and wife, with whom he resides in a swanky highrise in CBD Belapur.
All this might seem terribly ordinary if you didn't know about Sengupta's parallel life.

Occasionally, the 37 year-old takes off to far flung areas of the country, especially forests and swamps, carrying with him a sleeping bag, a supply of dry fruit, and a pair of leather boots that reach his knees, protecting him from snake bites. If unable to locate a cow shed to sleep in, the sleeping bag comes in handy.

On these trips that often last between four days to a month and a half, Sengupta, along with other skilled urban professionals from a variety of career fields, transforms into a 'citizen scientist' or amateur researcher.

Sengupta's task is as ambitious in nature as it is vital. He, along with 500 urban professionals, mostly from non-science and research backgrounds, are part of Lost Amphibians of India (LAI), a group that is searching for 50 Indian amphibian species, mostly frogs and caecilians, that are thought to have gone extinct. While several species have been sighted in the last 10 years, some have eluded researchers for over 169 years.

"It is an extremely important programme. Most Indians are concerned about certain 'prestigious' animals, and hardly ever give a thought to amphibians. Some of the species we are searching for have not been sighted for years. We need to see if they are still around," says Sengupta.

To read the full story, click here.

Because the climate is changing three times faster than animals can adapt to it, animals will need to change their natural range to survive. That is the conclusion of a new study on North American Rattlesnake populations.

"We find that, over the next 90 years, at best these species' ranges will change more than 100 times faster than they have during the past 320,000 years," said Michelle Lawing, lead author of the paper and a doctoral candidate in geological sciences and biology at IU Bloomington. "This rate of change is unlike anything these species have experienced, probably since their formation."

The study, "Pleistocene Climate, Phylogeny, and Climate Envelope Models: An Integrative Approach to Better Understand Species' Response to Climate Change," was published by the online science journal PLoS ONE. Co-author is P. David Polly, associate professor in the Department of Geological Sciences in the IU Bloomington College of Arts and Sciences.

The researchers make use of the fact that species have been responding to climate change throughout their history and their past responses can inform what to expect in the future.
They synthesize information from climate cycle models, indicators of climate from the geological record, evolution of rattlesnake species and other data to develop what they call "paleophylogeographic models" for rattlesnake ranges. This enables them to map the expansion and contraction at 4,000-year intervals of the ranges of 11 North American species of the rattlesnake genus Crotalus.

To read the full article, click here.

The movie Herpers was a ground breaking documentary film released in 2009 that was one of the first to explore the people and animals that make up the reptile and amphibian culture. With interviews with many noted breeders and hobbyists and footage from a number of private reptile breeding facilities, filmmaker Dav Kaufman took the world up close and personal with a culture many never knew existed. With the success of the first film, Dav jumped right back to work to produce a sequel.

kingsnake.com got the chance to talk movies with Dav Kaufman, director of Herpers II, the follow-up to his first film about the reptile community. Herpers II even includes an interview with our own Jeff Barringer.

To hear the interview, click here. And check out the trailer under the jump!

California concerns about Chytrid fungus is again bringing up the possible ban on importation of bullfrogs into the state.

They were imported from frog farms in Taiwan... environmental activist and former game warden [Miles Young] said.

The species is particularly susceptible to a skin fungus linked to vanishing amphibians around the world. And the conditions in which bullfrogs are raised, transported and sold are ideal breeding grounds for the fungus and its waterborne zoospores.

"It should be against the law to bring diseased nonnative animals into California," he grumbled. "But every time someone proposes a ban on bullfrogs, politics gets in the way and nothing gets done."

[....]

Opponents also said it unfairly targeted Asian American businesses because it did not affect the sale of turtles and frogs at pet stores.

In testimony before the panel, [Leland] Yee, an unsuccessful candidate in the Nov. 8 San Francisco mayoral election, said: "For over 5,000 years, it has been the practice of both the Chinese community and the Asian American community to consume these particular animals. They are part of our staple. They are part of our culture. They are part of our heritage."

For the full article, click here.

In our excitement over the possibility of the end of rattlesnake round-ups in Georgia, we mistook a press release as a valid news report. However here is some clarification from Georgia resident and venomous keeper, Chad Minter:

Cindy,
I noticed a couple of errors in your blog post.
First, Georgia has a different set of laws for wild animals (non-native) and wildlife (native.) Wild animal permits are not required for Eastern Diamondback Rattlesnakes. The authors of this letter have a gross misunderstanding of Georgia law.
The list of people permitted to keep Eastern Diamondbacks would be zero, because the permits are not required for native venomous species.
I am not an attorney, so I would urge anyone who is planning on keeping venomous in Georgia to contact their attorney AND Georgia DNR to make sure they are in compliance with all laws and regulations.
Second, I really don't think an out of state attorney and another out of state group would be considered "Georgia officials." I think the title may be misinterpreted to have a color of law.
Don't get me wrong, I do not support roundups at all, but the post does contain some misinformation.
Thanks,
Chad Minter
envenomated.com

I want to thank Chad for keeping us honest here. Below you will see the original posting I made.


So-called "Rattlesnake Round-ups" are disgusting public displays of animal abuse, made worse because the events are often attended and endorsed by local officials. The state of Georgia is bucking that trend.

Georgia state law requires that anyone who possesses a wild rattlesnake obtain a “wild animal license” from the Department of Natural Resources. For the sake of both animal welfare and public safety, the law requires those who keep wild rattlesnakes to buy liability insurance and treat the snakes humanely. The groups’ letter, sent by the Center, Coastal Plains Institute and Land Conservancy, and One More Generation, asks that appropriate law-enforcement measures be taken before and during the roundups to make sure sponsors and participants carry insurance and give the snakes humane treatment.

“Possession of wild rattlesnakes without a license is against the law in Georgia for good, common-sense reasons, and the state needs to make the law real by enforcing it,” said Collette Adkins Giese, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity who works to protect rare and vanishing reptiles and amphibians. “But the best way to stop the abuse of animals, make sure no one gets hurt, and save the eastern diamondback from extinction is to just cancel these roundups. The bottom line is, they’re cruel.”

Rattlesnake roundups are depleting populations of eastern diamondback rattlesnakes: Analysis of data from four roundups in the southeastern United States shows a steady decline in the weights of prize-winning eastern diamondbacks and the number collected. This once-common species is being pushed toward extinction not only by hunting pressure but also by habitat loss and road mortality. In August, the Center and allies filed a petition to protect the snake under the Endangered Species Act.

To read the press release, click here.

Photo from user SalS in our photo gallery

The near-complete skeleton of a plesiosaur, a type of marine reptile, has been unearthed in Alberta. While partial skeletons have been found in the past, this is the most complete finding so far.

"This thing would be many tens of metres (from) the surface" of the earth, said Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology curator Donald Henderson, who was at the site Thursday. "If it wasn't for the digging, we would never see this."

Heavy equipment operator Maggy Horvath was shovelling ore at the oilsands company's Mildred Lake mine site on Nov. 14 when her shovel exposed the neck and upper vertebrae of a plesiosaur.

A team from the Drumheller-based Royal Tyrrell was called in. But removing the fossil from its resting place, where it is now pushing through the face of a cliff about five metres above the mine pit's base, is a tricky job that hasn't even started.

"The rock is really crumbling and there's lots of fractures," said Henderson, noting there are safety and equipment issues. At this point, researchers have only begun to comb through the rubble removed from the cliff face in search of the plesiosaur's head and more of its neck.

To read the full article, click here.

The second most-commonly used pesticide is now showing that it causes reproduction problems in a number of species, including reptiles and amphibians.

Atrazine is the second-most widely used herbicide in the U.S. More than 75 million pounds of it are applied to corn and other crops, and it is the most commonly detected pesticide contaminant of groundwater, surface water and rain in the U.S.

The new review, compiled by 22 scientists studying atrazine in North and South America, Europe and Japan, appears in the Journal of Steroid Biochemistry and Molecular Biology.
The researchers looked at studies linking atrazine exposure to abnormal androgen (male hormone) levels in fish, amphibians, reptiles and mammals and studies that found a common association between exposure to the herbicide and the "feminization" of male gonads in many animals.

The most robust findings are in amphibians, said University of Illinois comparative biosciences professor Val Beasley, a co-author of the review. At least 10 studies found that exposure to atrazine feminizes male frogs, sometimes to the point of sex reversal, he said.

For the full article, click here.

Sea turtles are a common sight along some North American coastal areas, but for the first time, an Olive Ridley sea turtle was spotted in British Columbia.

"This is really exciting. It’s the first confirmed sighting in B.C. waters," said Jennifer Yakimishyn, species at risk recovery planner at Pacific Rim National Park Reserve.

Olive ridleys, which are listed in the United States as threatened, are warm water turtles, but there have been sightings in Washington and Alaska, so it was suspected there could be some in B.C. waters, Yakimishyn said.

"So this is a pretty significant find. It is the third (species of) turtle found in B.C. waters," she said. "My email box is full of messages from excited biologists. It’s causing a real stir in the science world."

The other two species found in B.C. are green and leatherback turtles, but neither is common.

Lisa Spaven, a Fisheries and Oceans Marine Mammal Response biologist, said the closest nesting beaches for olive ridley turtles are Mexico and California. Like all sea turtles, populations are endangered because of years of hunting.

To read the full article, click here.

Thought to be extinct for 50 years, the Hula Painted From (Discoglossus nigriventer) has reappeared!

The JNF removed the water from the swamp and redirected the flow of water to the river Jordan with artificial estuaries. But the operation led to numerous knock-on effects — the reclaimed land was useless for agriculture, toxins invaded the river and dumped peat routinely caught fire.

The disastrous operation also led to huge destruction of ecosystems, wiping out water plants, tropical aquatic ferns, the ray-finned fish Acanthobrama hulensis and the cichlid fish Tristramella intermedia. Until this week, it was thought that the hula painted frog was among the lost species.

But a routine patrol at the Ha’Hula lake by Israel’s Nature and Parks Authority turned up a mysterious, unknown female frog and took it back to the lab for testing. It was soon confirmed that it was a Hula painted frog, and the rare species had hung on amongst the devastation of its habitat.

For the full story, click here.
With news like this, the need to work harder on the conservation efforts of amphibians becomes all that more important.

“Our study shows that more than two thirds of the global amphibian diversity hotspots will likely be strongly affected by at least one of the three threats considered”, says Miguel Araújo from the Spanish Research Council.
“With more than 30 per cent of all amphibian species already listed as threatened by IUCN and many rare species still being discovered every year, our results highlight the need for greater conservation research and action for this highly threatened group,” said Yale University’s Walter Jetz.

For more on that article, click here.