"Some people think it's cruel for us to kill these venomous snakes. We would like for you to know we are protecting ourselves and our animals."

These words, spoken by a cute little blond third grade boy from Snyder Elementary School in Texas, left me in shock while I was watching the KC3-4Kids (Kids Creating Community Content) 2011 Contest presented by CILC and CISCO. The program was also shared with a school in Arizona.

The level of mis-information was shocking -- for example, they were taught that snakes only eat twice a year, that a headless, dead snake can still hurt you, and that the venom milked at the notorius "rattlesnake round-ups" is used to create anti-venom. No less staggering was the children discussing how pouring gas into snake den is a necessary measure to capture, the danger to all the cattle (even though they have to leave the ranch and head to rocks to capture the animals).

Adults prepared the script for these children, by the way. Children are the future and it is what they learn at this time that shape their minds. In Snyder, Texas, they are learning to practice and justify animal abuse.

Tell the program organizers this is not eduction, this is cruelty. Contact the program sponsors here:

Bev Mattocks
Center for Interactive Learning and Collaboration
bmattocks@cilc.org
Tweet @cilcorg

John Earnhardt
Cisco Corporate PR and Social Media communications
jearnhar@cisco.com
Tweet him @urnhart
Tweet Cisco @CiscoSystems

Tag your Tweets with #stopanimalcruelty for additional impact.

ETA: It worked! The video has been removed:

The Mountain Chicken frogs now have a new chance at life in their native island of Montserrat, and things are looking good for the species.

The frogs have been hunted for their meat, and Smith says that they were served up to restaurants and hotels to tourists that visited the island.

Not only does the island’s active volcano threaten the species, but also the infectious disease known as Chytridiomycosis.

Only two uninfected populations remain, and conservationists from Durrell, London Zoo, Chester Zoo and Parken Zoo set out an emergency rescue mission to airlift 50 of the frogs from the island.

A dozen of the frogs were then relocated to Jersey, U.K., where herpetology keepers successfully bred them in captivity.

After breeding, the conservationists then released 33 healthy frogs back onto the island in January, and since then a field team has spent three months tracking their progress.

“Some of the frogs were calling in the forest in the first night,” Smith told BBC. “Three months later the fact that we still have live frogs in the release site looking healthy and calling is a very encouraging sign.”

To read the full article, click here.

There are very few Louisiana pine snakes remaining in the wild, but exact numbers are unknown. The good news is efforts are underway to re-establish this native snake.

Scientists don't know how many Louisiana pine snakes exist. They're native only to Louisiana and Texas, and it's been several years since one was trapped in any of the three Texas areas where they had been caught in the 1990s and early 2000s.

That's "cause for pretty serious concern," Craig Rudolph, a scientist at the U.S. Forest Service Southern Research Station in Nacogdoches, Texas, said Wednesday. The other four populations, like the Kisatchie reintroduction site, are in Louisiana.

Another cause for concern is that plans to release 50 to 100 hatchlings a year have been stymied. Only 20 hatched in 2010 and 14 last year. Louisiana pine snakes have the largest eggs and hatchlings of any North American snake, coming out of the egg about 18 to 22 inches long, but each female lays only three to five 5-inch-long eggs.

"Some of the snakes in the zoos are getting older and not breeding," said Beau Gregory, a zoologist with the Louisiana Natural Heritage Program.

To read the full article, click here.

Never seen before in Tennessee, the Gulf Coast spiny softshell turtle, is the newest subspecies of turtle native to the Conasauga River.

“We are very excited about our new resident here in the state," Hedrick said. "The last time a new turtle was found in Tennessee was in 1986 when threatened bog turtles were discovered in Northeast Tennessee."

When contacted about the zoo’s discovery, Dr. A. Floyd Scott of the Department of Biology at Austin Peay University said, “David Hedrick and Rick Jackson’s discovery of the Gulf Coast spiny softshell turtle is significant because it adds a new taxon to the vertebrate fauna of Bradley County and, more importantly, to the state of Tennessee. Their find, coupled with a preserved specimen [recently confirmed as the Gulf Coast spiny softshell] in the North Carolina State Museum of Natural Sciences that was collected in 1974 from the Conasauga River in eastern Bradley County, suggest there is an established population there that has been overlooked until now."

The spotting of this subspecies is especially momentous because softshelled turtles are an extremely wary aquatic species that disappear at the first sign of danger. They spend a great deal of time buried in the stream bottom, waiting to ambush prey. Their necks are long, and they have tiny, pig-like noses that allow them to stretch up to the surface and breathe while the rest of their body remains buried in the sand and mud.

To read the full article, click here.

Recently, the newsworthy public displays of reptiles in the US have been the disgusting animal abuse events called Rattlesnake Roundups.

In Italy, things are different. There, in the tiny town of Cocullo in the Province of L'Aquila of Italy, the first of May is the Festa dei Serpari, or Snake Festival.

From Wikipedia:

Cocullo is known for his singular patron saint's holiday, named Festa dei Serpari, in which the patron saint's statue (Domenico di Sora) is transported in procession covered with lot of snakes (mainly four-lined, aesculapian, grass and green whip snakes). The reptiles themselves are transported in procession by local serpari[4], a sort of "snake breeders", and released in the surrounding woods at the end of the holiday[5][6]. The festival, set every first May since 2012 (in the past it took place every first thursday in May), is a receptive event for Italian and foreigner tourists. In 2009 it was cancelled due to some structural damages occurred into the village after the L'Aquila earthquake [7]. This tradition, present also in coat of arms symbolism[8], substituted the ancient Roman mythologic ritual of Angitia, a snake goddess worshipped by the Marsi.

A few amazing slideshows are out there. Check out the first one from the UPI and the second one at Demotix.com. The inset photo was taken from Demotix.com.

The most amazing and unusual of the crocodilians, the Gharial, is getting a new chance at life at the Crocodile Breeding Centre at Kasara.

The farm in Chitwan National Park, some 82 km (51 miles) southwest of Kathmandu, was opened in 1978 by the government with support from the Frankfurt Zoological Society in an effort to save the rapidly dwindling gharial, which is also found in neighboring India.

Six decades ago, gharials -- known for their long, slim snouts and great length, with some growing up to 7 meters (23 ft) long -- were numerous in Nepal. There were 235 in the Narayani-Rapti River, which flows near the park, alone.

But their numbers fell rapidly as they were killed for their skins, used to make purses, shoes and belts. Their eggs have been stolen for food or as a remedy for tuberculosis.

In addition, their riverside habitat has been lost to agriculture and water-control projects, with fishing nets also taking a toll.
As a result, their population is now confined to only a small area of Nepal's major rivers. A national census last year found only 102, numbers at which survival in the wild becomes difficult without help -- but that was still up from 50 in 1970, Sharma said.

The centre has three male and 12 female gharials for breeding. Workers also collect eggs from the wild before the onset of the annual floods in July, raise hatchlings in captivity and then release them into the wild.

"If it were not for this, you and I would not be able to see them now. They would have been extinct 15 to 20 years ago," Sharma said.

To read the full article, click here.

In a partnership between UK and Indian scientists, a new caecilian was discovered -- by pure accident!

The creature - about 168mm in length and pink in colour - belongs to an enigmatic, limbless group of amphibians known as the caecilians.

Ramachandran Kotharambath, lead author of the report, told the BBC Tamil Service that the animal was identified as a new species following extensive comparisons with other, similar examples from this amphibian group.

According to the researchers, specimens of the novel caecilian - named Gegeneophis primus - were collected during field works in two consecutive monsoons, first in October 2010 and then in August 2011.

They were discovered at a valley on a plantation in the Wynad district of Kerala.

The new finding was made as part of a longstanding research collaboration between the department of zoology at the University of Kerala and London's Natural History Museum. The Central University at Kasargod in Kerala also contributed to of the discovery.

To read the full article, click here.

The Anhui Yangtze Alligator Nature Reserve working is on its eighth release of the endangered Chinese alligator:

So far, the nature reserve has succeeded in releasing 45 Chinese alligators into the wild, and the six new members will bring the total to 51, sources with the reserve said.

"The experiments were successful, as the released alligators began laying eggs in 2008 and the alligators that hatched in the wild are in good conditions," said Wang Chaolin, deputy director of the nature reserve.

Wang said researchers need to choose young and healthy alligators so they will survive harsh natural conditions. The alligators will also undergo DNA testing before being released to avoid in-breeding.

To read the full article, click here.

Is lemonade a trigger for deadly python attacks?

No, but you wouldn't know it from a recent HSUS press release that sounds like a script for a new movie, Snakes in a Suburb :

"Unsuspecting people across the country are encountering, and even being attacked by someone else’s escaped or released constrictor snake while tending to their gardens, making lemonade in their kitchens, pulling laundry from their washing machines, or sleeping in their beds."

Now, compare that to the original article about the incident:

Apartment managers have vowed to fully investigate the report, but they have yet to confirm its validity. Residents, who were told to notify apartment staff or animal control if they see the python, have not reported any sightings to authorities.

Despite the fact that nobody has actually seen the python, the report, which very well could be a mean-spirited hoax, has been enough to rile up some residents. Some have expressed that going outside the apartment has become a scary proposition. Others are hoping the python cannot sneak its way into the building.

A snake that no one has verified, that no one is claiming to own, that no one has seen in the complex before the single sighting in the parking garage. My sister's cousin's best friend from first grade once saw a python, too!

The reptile community as a whole looks down upon those who release any pets into the wild. This includes dogs and cats, along with any other type of pet. I don't see HSUS releasing a press release regarding dogs being let into the wild only to kill you while you sleep, but in their continued attack on the reptile community, they take fear mongering to a whole new height.

Having worked animal control, I can verify that most snakes sighted in garages and basements are actually things such as bungee cords and hoses instead of an actual snake. But HSUS relies on sensationalism and paranoia instead of those pesky little things called facts. Why do we let them get away with it?