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Since moving to Virginia, I must say that something I miss about Georgia is that no matter the season, there are always ...
02/15/2026

Since moving to Virginia, I must say that something I miss about Georgia is that no matter the season, there are always plenty of cool amphibians to be found. With mild temperatures and often plenty of rain, even the Piedmont and mountains of North Georgia are alive with activity. Here is a selection of some of those species that seem to become abundant as temps begin to drop.

1-3: Webster’s Salamander (Plethodon websteri)
4: Upland Chorus Frog (Pseudacris feriarum)
5: Marbled Salamander (Ambystoma maculatum)
6: Four-toed Salamander (Hemidactylium scutatum)
7-8: Spring Salamander (Gyrinophilus porphyriticus)
9: Southern Red-backed Salamander (Plethodon serratus)
10: Mole Salamander (Ambystoma talpoideum)
11: Southern Zig-zag Salamander (Plethodon ventralis)

Finally decided to post again after quite the hiatus. Been busy with PhD duties and of course, looking for neat animals ...
02/13/2026

Finally decided to post again after quite the hiatus. Been busy with PhD duties and of course, looking for neat animals here and there as well. For my first post back, I’ll pick up right where I started, traveling across Colombia with .h in 2024. While not the most diverse trip to the Neotropics I’ve been on, it certainly had some remarkable highlights, and from Los Llanos to the Pacific Chocó, we managed to turn up some incredible snakes. From the iconic to the obscure, there is a snake in the tropics that will astonish everyone: beauty, size, rarity, or just being plain weird.

1 and 2: Green Anaconda (Eunectes murinus)
3: Banded Cat-eyed Snake (Leptodeira ashmeadii)
4: Fer-de-Lance (Bothrops asper)
5: Boddaert’s Tropical Racer (Mastigodryas boddaerti)
6-7: Common Mussurana (Clelia clelia)
8: Ornate Cat-eyed Snake (Leptodeira ornata)
9: Ringed Tree Boa (Corallus annulatus)
10: Blunt-headed Tree Snake (Imantodes cenchoa)
11: Cope’s Vine Snake (Oxybelis brevirostris)
12: Rough Coffee Snake (Nothopsis rugosus)

Any trip to the American West reminds me that the US DOES have cool lizard diversity. With tons of structure and variety...
04/15/2025

Any trip to the American West reminds me that the US DOES have cool lizard diversity. With tons of structure and variety in the form of cliff faces, desert flats, forested uplands, and grassy lowlands, the Rocky Mountain formations of Colorado and Utah are prime for these four-legged squamates.

1) Eastern Collared Lizard (Crotaphytus collaris)
2) Long-nosed Leopard Lizard (Gambelia wislizenii)
3) Greater Short-horned Lizard (Phrynosoma hernandesi)
4) Sagebrush Lizard (Sceloporus graciosus)
5) Western Whiptail (Aspidoscelis tigris)
6) Side-blotched Lizard (Uta stansubrinus)
7) Plateau Fence Lizard (Sceloporus tristichus)
8) Southern Prairie Lizard (Sceloporus consobrinus)


**petology **petofauna **ping **ping

To finish off our trip up the Appalachians, we had to jump across the valley to the Cumberland Plateau for our last targ...
04/10/2025

To finish off our trip up the Appalachians, we had to jump across the valley to the Cumberland Plateau for our last target. While the bulk of Desmognathus diversity is held in the southern Blue Ridge (as most Plethodontid diversity in the East is), there are a few species that live in this overlooked portion of the Appalachians. One such species is the Cumberland Mountain Dusky Salamander which inhabits rocky cliff faces often not far from another famous cliff dweller, the Green Salamander.

1) Cumberland Dusky Salamander (Desmognathus abditus)
2) Green Salamander (Aneides aeneus)


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On from the Yucatán and off to South America. Last year I was able to travel across the country of Colombia with none ot...
04/08/2025

On from the Yucatán and off to South America. Last year I was able to travel across the country of Colombia with none other than incredible partner, Lavendar. Over the span of two weeks, we travelled from coast to coast, from the Andean Paramo to Los Llanos, the lowlands of the Orinoco Basin. While not the most diverse group of our trip, as anywhere in the tropics, it’s hard to go anywhere without seeing some kind of lizard, making them the first h**p of pretty much every stop of our trip.

1) Giant Ameiva (Ameiva praesignis)
2) Golden Tegu (Tupinambis teguixin)
3) First Anole (Anolis princeps)
4) Western Basilisk (Basiliscus galeritus)
5) Northern Turnip-tailed Gecko (Thecadactylus rapicauda)
6) Northern Root Tegu (Loxopholis southi)


From one trip out west to the next, this time a few states to the north with Lavendar. Over the span of two weeks we tra...
04/01/2025

From one trip out west to the next, this time a few states to the north with Lavendar. Over the span of two weeks we travelled across the southern portions of the Rocky Mountains and their associated geologic formations. Of course, throughout this trip, we made some efforts to see the neat h**ps that call these beautiful places home, such as this selection of non-venomous snakes from Colorado and Utah.

1) Bull Snake (Pituophis catenifer)
2) Western Hognose Snake (Heterodon nasicus)
3) Smooth Green Snake (Opheodrys vernalis)
4) Striped Whipsnake (Masticophis taeniatus)
5) Eastern Yellow-bellied Racer (Coluber constrictor)


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At least once a year, I can’t help myself but to make a pilgrimage to one of the most salamander diverse places on the p...
03/28/2025

At least once a year, I can’t help myself but to make a pilgrimage to one of the most salamander diverse places on the planet, the Blue Ridge Mountains of western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee. While this area shares so many species with the surrounding regions, it also has some of the most regionally endemic species of anywhere in the country, all found across a relatively small stretch of the ancient Appalachian Mountains. Here is a selection of that diversity found with some great friends from 2023.

1) Nantahala Black-bellied Salamander (Desmognathus amphileucus)
2) Northern Seal Salamander (Desmognathus monticola)
3) Western Shovel-nosed Salamander (Desmognathus intermedius)
4) Red-legged Salamander (Plethodon shermani)
5) Santeetlah Dusky Salamander (Desmognathus santeetlah)
6) Imitator Salamander (Desmognathus imitator)
7) Cherokee Black-bellied Salamander (Desmognathus gvnigeusgwotli)


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To close out my first trip to the Yucatán Peninsula, I want to appreciate the grade clade of Archelosauria. This ancient...
03/27/2025

To close out my first trip to the Yucatán Peninsula, I want to appreciate the grade clade of Archelosauria. This ancient clade of reptiles includes crocodilians and turtles, what we consider as the “typical” reptilian members, as well as the avian and non-avian dinosaurs, birds. Without birds, this group has among the lowest extant diversity of reptiles, and overall have quite low diversity for the major living groups of vertebrates. These two species happen to be endemic to the Mayan Rainforests of the Yucatán Peninsula and surrounding region.

1-3) Morelet’s Crocodile (Crocodylus moreletii)
4) Creaser’s Mud Turtle (Kinosternon creaseri)


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What the American Southwest is most well known for its lizard and snake diversity, I find it quite remarkable that salam...
03/26/2025

What the American Southwest is most well known for its lizard and snake diversity, I find it quite remarkable that salamanders still find a way survive in a region dominated by desert and arid grasslands. New Mexico not only has some diversity of salamanders, but is home to two endemic species of Plethodontids. We had the privilege to see the full span of salamander diversity of this unsuspecting ecosystem.

1) Jemez Mountain Salamander (Plethodon neomexicanus)
2) Sonoran Tiger Salamander hybrid (Ambystoma m. stebbinsi)
3) Arizona Tiger Salamander (Ambystoma m. nebulosa)
4-8) Sacramento Mountain Salamander (Aneides hardii)


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The fieldwork misadventures continue from West Virginia to Kentucky. Whilst conducting my own field work, I was also ass...
03/25/2025

The fieldwork misadventures continue from West Virginia to Kentucky. Whilst conducting my own field work, I was also assisting on my advisor’s ongoing Desmognathus research and my pseudo-lab-mate’s research on salamander locomotion. Here are some of the focal species for our Kentucky expedition.

1 and 2) Black Mountain Dusky Salamander (Desmognathus welteri)
3 and 4) Northern Dusky Salamander (Desmognathus fuscus)
5) Long-tailed Salamander (Eurycea longicauda
6) Green Salamander (Aneides aeneus)

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One thing which Mexico really does well is Vipers. Rattlesnakes, Tree Vipers, Pit Vipers, it really does span just about...
03/07/2025

One thing which Mexico really does well is Vipers. Rattlesnakes, Tree Vipers, Pit Vipers, it really does span just about everything we have here in the Western Hemisphere. The Yucatán peninsula, due to its shorter, dry forests, doesn’t get many arboreal vipers, however, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t get some hinge-fanged inhabitants. Here are a few terrestrial vipers from my first time to the Peninsula.

1 and 2) Yucatán Cantil (Agkistrodon russelosus)
3) Fer-de-lance (Bothrops asper)


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Of course, one cannot make a trip to Arizona without seeing a rattlesnake. For my first ever trip to the Southwest and s...
03/06/2025

Of course, one cannot make a trip to Arizona without seeing a rattlesnake. For my first ever trip to the Southwest and spending a grand total of 2.5 days in the state, I felt quite happy with the diversity we were able to find. From high elevation conifer forests to low grassy flats and the desert in between, it is no mystery how Arizona has become perhaps the Rattlesnake Capital of the World.

1 and 2) Twin-spotted Rattlesnake (Crotalus pricei)
3) Arizona Ridge-nosed Rattlesnake (Crotalus willardi)
4) Banded Rock Rattlesnake (Crotalus lepidus)
5) Mojave Rattlesnake (Crotalus scutulatus)
6) Western Diamondback Rattlesnake (Crotalus atrox)
7) Northern Black-tailed Rattlesnake (Crotalus molossus)
8 and 9) Prairie Rattlesnake (Crotalus viridis)


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