Tag archives for reptiles
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This month 36 Philippine freshwater crocodiles were introduced into the wild on Siargao Island, in an effort to bolster the population of this endangered reptile. The Philippine freshwater crocodile (Crocodylus mindorensis), also called the Mindoro crocodile, is found only in the Philippines. The Philippine crocodile shares the island chain with the much more common Indo-Pacific crocodile or saltwater…
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Day five of our expedition to the Galapagos islands took us to the northwest slope of Santa Cruz for a walk up Cerro Dragon, “Dragon Hill.” This place was once home to a thriving colony of the massive Galapagos land iguana, Conolophus subcristatus. The lizard is making a comeback here after being nearly wiped out by cats, rats, and dogs introduced to the Galapagos by humans.
Following tests on smaller islands, the government of Ecuador today begins the second phase of dropping massive amounts of specially designed poison on a Galapagos island thought to be infested with nearly 200 million invasive rats. Introduced centuries ago by pirates, whalers and other visitors, the rodents wreak havoc among the wildlife of Galapagos by preying on eggs and hatchlings of bird and reptile species.
As bird populations plummet worldwide, will Earth become the Planet of the Spiders? Research on Guam, a 30-mile-long U.S. island in the Pacific, found that arachnid populations increased as much as 40-fold in the wake of insect-eating birds being eaten into oblivion by invasive brown treesnakes.
Eighteen smooth green snakes bred in captivity were released into the northern Illinois prairie a few dozen miles from Chicago today.
I had been standing still for at least a half hour, counting and identifying the birds that landed on a large snag — a standing dead tree — on the edge of a small wetland in rural southern Indiana, as part of undergraduate research. Sweating in my waders on that steamy summer day, I…
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Pythons sometimes have eyes too big for their stomachs—read about some particularly epic snake meals that went bust.
During the recent BioBlitz in the Saguaro National park, Arizona, we met two members of the Tucson Herpetological Society: Robert Villa and Hanna Strauss. The Tucson Herp Society is dedicated to conservation, education and research concerning the amphibians and reptiles of Arizona and Mexico. Villa and Strauss were at the BioBlitz with two species of…
When the clock stopped at noon on Saturday, more than 170 scientists and 2,000 students had collected or identified 859 species in the 94,000-acre park.
Posted by NG Young Explorer Neil Losin reveals the method behind the madness of his latest experiment catching tiny lizards called anoles in the wilds of urban Florida.
Authorities in Madagascar this week arrested two men and seized close to 200 of some of the world’s rarest tortoises that they were trying to smuggle out of Antananarivo’s Ivato Airport to Jakarta, Indonesia, TRAFFIC, the wildlife monitoring network, said today.
The unusually cold weather is stranding scores of distressed sea turtles along the southern U.S. Atlantic coast. “More than 100 turtles have washed up cold stunned on North Carolina beaches in the past week,” the South Carolina Aquarium said in a news statement. When sea turtles are in cold water for long they have a hypothermic reaction, the…
Do we need to double our conservation efforts? One fifth of the world’s vertebrates–mammals, birds, amphibians, reptiles and fishes–is threatened with extinction, according to a worldwide assessment by thousands of scientists. But had it not been for conservation measures, they say, the number of species on the threatened list would be doubled. Legislation enacted to ban…
The first group of hatchlings from endangered sea turtle eggs brought from beaches along the northern U.S. Gulf Coast was released into the Atlantic Ocean off NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on July 11, NASA said in this video released on YouTube. “Twenty-two Kemp’s ridley turtles were set free on a Kennedy Space Center/Canaveral…
Saguaro National Park, bordering Tucson, Arizona, has been named as the host site for the 2011 National Park Service/National Geographic BioBlitz, scheduled for October 21 and 22, 2011. “Part scientific endeavor, part festival and part outdoor classroom, BioBlitz is a two-day celebration of biodiversity centered on a 24-hour race to count species. During the BioBlitz,…
Adding to the crushing evidence of global species decline is a new study by an international group of scientists that snakes may now also be in retreat. The disappearance of such top predators may have serious consequences for the functioning of many ecosystems, scientists warn. Newly published data from the UK, France, Italy and Nigeria provides…
Among the scientists participating in the 2010 BioBlitz, in Biscayne National Park at the end of April, is Neil Losin, a National Geographic Young Explorer. Losin received a grant from National Geographic in 2009 to study territorial behavior between species, specifically two species of exotic lizards that have taken up residence in Florida. Photo of…
By Bryan Wallace During their decades-long lives, sea turtles must endure a ceaseless gauntlet of predators–beaked, toothed, clawed, and thumbed–and human-made hazards like coastal development and plastic trash posing as prey. Unfortunately, even if they succeed in evading these threats, millions of sea turtles worldwide are unable to avoid falling victim to the most serious,…
Madagascar’s radiated tortoise–considered one of the most beautiful tortoise species–is rapidly nearing extinction due to rampant hunting for its meat and the illegal pet trade, a team of biologists from the Turtle Survival Alliance (TSA) and Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) reported today. “The team predicts that unless drastic conservation measures take place, the species will…
Herp alert: A new species of South East Asian Cnemaspis gecko has been discovered in the rocky foothills of Cambodia’s Cardamom Mountains. The unique combination of its color pattern and scale characteristics, not seen in any other Southeast Asian species of Cnemaspis, has resulted in it being officially recognized as new to science, the conservation…
Editor’s note: The letter published on this page is a response by professional breeders of pythons to ongoing coverage and debate of the issue of whether or not the U.S. climate –now or in future–could make parts of the United States suitable habitat for exotic constrictor snakes. The larger issue at stake is whether or not…
Competition among male side-blotched lizards takes the form of a rock-paper-scissors game in which each mating strategy beats and is beaten by one other strategy, research has shown. Barry Sinervo, a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of California in Santa Cruz (UCSC), has monitored the mating game in a population of…
New measures to conserve and manage sustainably bluefin tuna, elephants, and a wide range of sharks, corals, reptiles, insects and plants have been proposed by governments attending the next world conference of the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). Over 40 proposals will be decided on at the conference,…
Biologists and veterinarians are urging the U.S. Congress to hold off on a ban on trade in pythons and other large exotic snakes until research into how much of a threat they pose to U.S. ecosystems has been thoroughly reviewed by independent scientists. In a letter to the U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary (full text at…
Concerned that the headline-grabbing news of nonnative giant snakes invading Florida’s Everglades and possibly more of the U.S. is becoming politcized and ignoring science, the United States Association of Reptile Keepers (USARK) is speaking out. Several people have written to NatGeo News Watch in response to our early posts, Congress weighs ban on importation of…
