The hard drive on my laptop bricked recently, and while going through the laborious process of restoring files from backup, I came across a folder labeled ‘10292006’ in my image archive. Opening the folder and looking at the images within, I remembered that October 29th, 2006 had been a good…
Read more
There’s not much trouble with this herping life, except for the Too-Many-Too-Much problem: too many places to visit, too much to see, and too much to cram into a relatively short lifespan. It always boils down to money and time; choices have to be made, and there are too many…
Read more
The Madre Selva field station is on the banks of the Rio Orosa, and if you go out on that river at night, you can find Spectacled Caiman (Caiman crocodilus) in the quieter backwaters, their eyes glowing red when hit with a flashlight. Go up the shallow side creeks and…
Read more
‘I am Nag,’ said the cobra; ‘look, and be afraid!’….But at the bottom of his cold heart, he was afraid. -Kipling It was our last full herping day in Thailand, and so far all of our venomous snakes had been pit vipers (Trimeresurus vogeli), at rest on tree branches over…
Read more
“There ain’t much between the Pole and South Dakota, and barb wire won’t stop the wind…” So goes a pretty good song by James McMurtry, but I beg to differ with him – there’s a whole bunch of North Dakota in the way, to say nothing of Manitoba. I was…
Read more
The new herping season unfolds and whatever may happen, I know that at some point I will be standing in chilly water, listening to the peeps, whistles, trills, clicks, clacks, bleats and moans of calling frogs and toads. Few things give me greater pleasure and I would not miss this…
Read more
“When you go, check out the city parks – those are the best places to see water monitors.” I’ve heard this advice from several sources, and since we had a number of days scheduled in Bangkok, it seemed like a no-brainer. One of the reasons I picked a hotel out…
Read more
My buddy Justin posted a link to a paper on Facebook yesterday: “The desert tortoise trichotomy: Mexico hosts a third, new sister-species of tortoise in the Gopherus morafkai – G. agassizii group”. I’ve been waiting for this; it’s been known for some time that Gopherus populations in southern Sonora and…
Read more
Andrew Durso’s Life Is Short, But Snakes Are Long is one of my favorite herp blogs. In his latest installment, Andrew talks about books, bushmasters, and Ditmars – a few of my favorite things, all wrapped up neatly together in one post.
I ask that question from time to time. “Uh, because it’s Regina?” I never liked that answer. If ‘Queen Snake’ springs from Regina, the name of its genus, then where does Regina come from? If it’s the other way ’round, then who is responsible? Sorting this out has been less than satisfying,…
Read more