Reptile & Amphibian News Blog
Keep up with news and features of interest to the reptile and amphibian community on the kingsnake.com blog. We cover breaking stories from the mainstream and scientific media, user-submitted photos and videos, and feature articles and photos by Jeff Barringer, Richard Bartlett, and other herpetologists and herpetoculturists.
Wednesday, January 15 2014
What's beautiful? The sweet sounds of the Harding University choir as heard in the Reptile House at the Cincinnati Zoo.
Watch below:
This image of an Amber Stripe Corn Snake, uploaded by kingsnake.com user SickPython, is our herp photo of the day!
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Tuesday, January 14 2014
Ever since I had learned of the existence of the mountain skink, Plestiodon callicephalus, I had wanted to see the lizard in situ.
There was just a special something about the blue in the tail of this skink that brought it to the top of my "I-wanna-see" list.
But when I asked Randy Babb to show me one of these skinks in situ, I had no idea it was going to involve a 20-mile power walk across sere desert beneath a blazing sun (about 140F ground temp!).
Or at least it seemed that hot and far to me, a Floridian who's unused to desert conditions. Of course, when Randy (a desert fox) relates the tale, it was a slow one mile walk on a moderately warm day along a cool path on the banks of a lake. How can his memory be so faulty? .
But at the end we saw not only one but several of the beautiful skinks. Mission accomplished. Thanks, Randy.
More photos under the jump...
Continue reading "A long, hot walk for a skink"
![](/blog/uploads/frogoff.jpg) It's hard to know how we missed this froggy story from last fall, but we did.
From the Atlantic:
NASA's Minotaur V rocket blasted off from its launchpad at a spaceport in Virginia, carrying the LADEE spacecraft on the first leg of its trip from Earth to the moon. The scene that resulted was beautiful. It was inspiring. It was epic.
It was also not without its casualties.
The picture above, snapped on Friday by one of the remote cameras NASA had set up for the big launch, captured a creature that found itself, alas, caught in the crossfire of humanity's drive to explore: a frog. A possibly very large, and certainly very surprised, frog. The launch setting, NASA's Wallops Flight Facility, is located on an island that is essentially a six-mile-long salt marsh; this little guy, it seems, happened to be in the wrong place at the wrongest possible time.
Read the rest here.
Photo: NASA/Wallops/Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport with Chris Heller
This image of a Gaboon Viper, uploaded by kingsnake.com user Blake_Herman, is our herp photo of the day!
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Monday, January 13 2014
![](http://gallery.connectedbypets.com/data/202475_DSC9627-med.jpg) Texas is considering banning the gassing of rattlesnakes and other animals in the state, but the Texas Parks and Wildlife Dept. doesn't think a ban will impact the barbaric "rattslesnake round-ups," which torture and kill rattlesnakes, but rarely use gas.
From NPR:
Pouring gasoline or other noxious chemicals into the earth to force rattlesnakes and other animals from their underground homes has been a tactic of some hunters and snake wranglers for years. But it has a harmful effect on the environment and wildlife. Now, Texas Parks and Wildlife (TPWD) is considering following in the path of 30 other states and banning the practice in most circumstances.
The technique, known as "gassing" is used to capture and/or kill many different types of animals, including prairie dogs. But its greatest defenders appear to be those involved in "rattlesnake roundups" that are a tradition in parts of the state.
[....]
As far as the prospect that banning the practice will end the "rattlesnake roundup" tradition in Texas, TPWD says that's overblown.
"Many rattlesnake events currently discourage the collection of snakes by gassing," says the Department.
Read more here.
Photo: kingsnake.com user kevinjudd
This image of a Anole, uploaded by kingsnake.com user cpinedo, is our herp photo of the day!
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Friday, January 10 2014
This image of a Frilled Dragon, uploaded by kingsnake.com user rumor150, is our herp photo of the day!
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Check out this video "Field Herping in Colorado" submitted by kingsnake.com user jfarah.
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!
Thursday, January 9 2014
As have the ranges of several other amphibians in Florida, the range of the rusty mud salamander, Pseudotriton montanus floridanus, seems to have shrunk noticeably.
Once found as far south as the Orlando area, those populations as well as others on the peninsula now seem extirpated. Although I may be overlooking some populations, to be even reasonably assured of finding this southernmost of the mud salamanders one must now travel northwestward to the panhandle counties.
Jake Scott and I recently did just that. We sought and found a suitable locale that was about four hours distant. Almost as soon as we entered the swampy habitat, we walked by a big log. Thinking it was simply too large to roll, we continued along.
We turned logs and debris for the next three hours -- zilch on the target salamanders. On the way back out, the last log we saw was that one we hadn't turned on the way in. We decided it was going to be turned, and it actually was a simple matter to do so (proving that appearances can indeed be deceiving).
Jake had found a lifer. Although it was the only mud salamander found on that day, it alone made the lengthy trip a success.
More photos under the jump...
Continue reading "A muddy day, muddy shoes, and rusty mud salamanders"
The LA Times has the scoop on a new study from Nature on the coloration of ancient reptiles:
Ancient leatherback turtles, ichthyosaurs and mosasaurs were a rather staid and formal black, maybe with some gray, according to a study published online Wednesday in the journal Nature.
![](/blog/uploads/Colors.jpg)
The study offers the first direct chemical evidence of pigmentation in the three species, and illustrates an example of convergent evolution, when animals separately develop the same adaptive features.
Read the rest here.
Artist's rendering: Stefan Solberg/LA Times
This image of a Yellow Rat Snake, uploaded by kingsnake.com user Herpetologia, is our herp photo of the day!
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Wednesday, January 8 2014
![](http://gallery.connectedbypets.com/data/81360Bullfrog_male_2-med.jpg) The intrepid researchers at the University of Oklahoma tested the old adage about how if you put a frog in boiling water he'll jump right out, but if you put him in cold water and slowly warm it, he'll be lulled into a false sense of security until it's too late. What did they find out?
From io9.com:
Dr. Victor Hutchison, at the University of Oklahoma, dispelled the myth when he studied frogs' reaction to temperature changes in water. He followed the procedure outlined for a proper frog-boiling; put a frog in cold water, and gradually warmed the water up. (He stopped well before the boiling point.) The frogs most definitely did jump out when the water got too warm for them.
Read the rest here. (And no, no frogs were boiled to test the other part of the adage.)
Photo: kingsnake.com user coluberking25
This image of a Big-headed Turtle, uploaded by kingsnake.com user stingray, is our herp photo of the day!
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Tuesday, January 7 2014
![](/blog/uploads/12698beaujanglesunder.jpg) Baby, it's cold out there. But are your efforts to keep your reptiles warm putting them -- and you! -- in danger?
From an article written for kingsnake.com by Susan Jacob:
My tortoise and my lizards have extended time out in the sunshine in the summer. Once fall arrives, it's time to start getting everyone indoors. Here in New York it is not good reptile weather after late September. The lizards have their own set ups, but the sulcata tortoise, being as big as she is, is in a pen in my boiler/laundry room. I have 80-degree temperatures in that room for most of the winter, with an occasional drop when the weather is really cold. Most of the animals can take that and I don't keep the heat too high at night.
I always keep the tortoise on fresh timothy or alfalfa hay and I switch off in the winter when she isn't getting the green grass of the lawn to graze on. In the past few winters I used an UVB/heat bulb over her pen, but always had a problem getting it to stay put. I use the metal light bulb holders with the clips and it seems they always slip and fall sideways directing the heat to the other direction or worse into the plastic wall of the pen. I meant to buy a holder to keep the light fixture upright, but kept putting it off.
I was doing laundry at the time in the basement and that day the tortoise was hiding under her hay, so I adjusted the UVB/heat bulb in her direction, using the clip on the back of the fixture to attach it to my husband's workbench, which is along side her pen. Ten minutes later, I was supposed to leave to go food shopping, but had put it off a bit to go online and check my email. Thank God I did, because that little sidetrack probably saved my house. I was upstairs for maybe five minutes, tops, when the downstairs fire/smoke alarm went off. I was busy on the computer and it took about three seconds to realize what it was. I was thinking it was the alarm on the washer when it goes out of balance. When it finally hit me I took off for the basement. I swear I took the last four steps in a leap, twisting my calf muscle in the process.
When I rushed into the reptile room the lamp had popped off and was lying fully on and operational down in the hay in the tortoise enclosure. The room was smoky and the hay was blackened and smoldering. I grabbed the light and put it on the floor and grabbed the entire armful of blackened hay and ran and dumped it in the slop sink and turned on the water. It had not ignited in a flash, but I believe if I had been a few minutes later it would have flashed into flames. The entire pen, my laundry room with hanging clothes and all my lizard litter enclosures would have been on fire. My basement ceiling is only six feet, so if the hay had blazed upwards and caught the ceiling I would never have been able to stop it.
Read the rest here!
Photo: kingsnake.com user StephaneA
This image of a Collared Lizard, uploaded by kingsnake.com user wwwwwells, is our herp photo of the day!
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Monday, January 6 2014
![](/blog/uploads/BabyCrocs.jpg) Someone thought it would be funny to release nine baby crocodiles into an Australian swimming pool, but it cost one of the babies his life.
From the North West Star:
The 25-30 centimetre crocodiles are still at the pool in a turtle tank waiting to be picked up by local snake and reptile handler Gavin Lawrence.
He said what started as a harmless prank ended up killing one of the baby crocodiles.
"It's annoying they've dumped them in the pool," he said.
"The chlorine is no good for them and at the end of the day it's sort of reckless."
Mrs Rodriquez said she suspected the baby crocodile succumbed to the heat after it was found after closing time outside of the pool.
Read the full story here.
Photo: North West Star
This image of a Blood Python, uploaded by kingsnake.com user jsignoretti, is our herp photo of the day!
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Friday, January 3 2014
Each year, a German conservation organization called NABU lists those animals it considers most in need of protection in the coming year. This year, one of those animals is the yellow-bellied toad:
See the rest of the animals NABU thinks need special protection here.
Photo: dw.de
This image of a Newt, uploaded by kingsnake.com user gmerker, is our herp photo of the day!
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Check out our Herp Video of the Week, "Corn Snake Morphs and Genetics," submitted by kingsnake.com user boa2cobras.
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!
Thursday, January 2 2014
About 30 years ago I purchased a half dozen of these alert and attractive little turtles, Geoemyda spengleri, for about 20 dollars each.
I bred this taxon for many years, but finally allowed myself to be talked out of them by a friend. It was a divestiture that I have regretted over the years, so recently I began thinking of restarting the project. But after pricing the little guys at today's market price of 500 to 700 dollars each, the probability of this occurring now seems minimal.
I am sure glad that I had the opportunity to work with this alert and intelligent little (carapace length of about 4.25 inches) Asian species.
More photos under the jump...
Continue reading "Black-breasted leaf turtles: The ones that got away"
This image of a Chameleon, uploaded by kingsnake.com user BryanConroy19, is our herp photo of the day!
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Wednesday, January 1 2014
Happy New Year, and enjoy our first herp photo of 2014, uploaded by kingsnake.com user toshamc!
Upload your own reptile and amphibian photos photos at gallery.kingsnake.com, and you could see them featured here!
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