
Amphibians, Reptiles, & Natural History

Naturalist, Photographer , Zoologist
After retiring from a career teaching biology and anatomy & physiology and science administration, I study reptiles and amphibians (but focus mostly on squamates). My current interest are in snake phylogeny and diversity, highly aquatic snakes (that are non-sea snakes), the herpetofauna of Trinidad and Tobago, and giant snakes. I have been on the Board of Directors of the Chicago Herpetological Society, the Board of Directors of the Tucson Herpetological Society; a research associate at the Field Museum in Chicago. I have been a member of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s (IUCN) Snake Specialists Group International Society for the History and Bibliography of Herpetology (ISHBH); and on the board of directors of Friends of Madera Canyon.

January 6, 2020Queensland AustraliaAfter a day in the pool of their new Airlie Beach home, the Thompson family and their friends were heading inside when screaming rang out.The sight which confronted Evan Thompson is…
Najash is an extinct genus of basal snakes from the Late Cretaceous (Candeleros Formation) of Patagonia. Some modern snakes retain traces of hind legs – boas, pythons, leptotyphlopids, and others. Some Cretaceous snakes also…

The corpse of a Reticulated Python (Malayopython reticulatus), on the Jose De Diego Highway (PR 22) Arecibo. A Facebook post contained the photo below and the comment that the species has also been sighted…
Arcanumophis problematicus from Santo Domingo, Peru. Photographs by A. Catenazzi. The snake Liophis problematicus was described as a new species by Myers in 1986. The holotype was collected at 1520 m on the Amazonian side…
Above: Seven species of anoles found on the islands in the Eastern Tropical Pacific (ETP). Top row, left to right: Dactyloa agassizi (Isla Malpelo), Dactyloa gorgonae (Isla Gorgona), Norops townsendi (Isla Cocos). Bottom row: Norops medemi, Norops parvauritus, Dactyloa princeps, Dactyloa chocorum (all Isla Gorgona).…
Imantodes cenchoa Many herpetologists who have done fieldwork over the last several decades have commented on declines in snake populations. Snakes, unlike frogs, don’t vocalize, they usually don’t congregate for reproduction, and they are…
There’s a species of poison frog called the “strawberry frog” or the “blue jeans frog,” depending on who you ask. These frogs are smaller than a quarter, with bright red bodies and navy blue…
SerpentResearch has been rated as one of the Top 10 Herpetology Blogs by Feedspot.com
Elephant Trunk Snake, Acrochordus javanicus. JCM In a recent paper Zaher et al. (2019) examine Caenophidian snake phylogeny. Caenophidian snakes include the file snake genus Acrochordus and advanced colubroidean snakes that radiated mainly during…