Everybody can herp!

“Herping” is the art of searching for reptiles and amphibians. It’s like birding, only you look down instead of up. Our daughter Sophia has been herping for as long as she’s been walking.

As Sophia’s gotten older, it’s been wonderful to observe her joy in finding reptiles and amphibians when we spend time in the woods.

We’d love it if you could find some reptiles and amphibians too! April to June is the best time to see salamanders, frogs, snakes, lizards, and turtles in our area. At Wild Columbia, we’ve started collecting reptile and amphibians sightings from all over Columbia County, and our project greatly benefits from each additional person who helps out with a sighting. More detailed information about this herping project can be found at the following link:

Columbia County Reptiles and Amphibians

If you’d like to participate, just create an iNaturalist account and upload observations there or, if you’d rather, contact us here at Wild Columbia and send us the picture, date, and location where you found it.

iNaturalist is a wonderful tool. If you download the app onto your phone, you can use the app to take a picture of any plant or animal you see and the app will automatically upload the entry to the database with date, time, and location included. You can even use the app’s photo recognition feature to identify the plant/animal for you, or wait for other iNaturalist members to suggest their IDs. It’s a neat way to figure out the name of things you come across in nature.

To see the progress of our project on iNaturalist, check out the following link:

https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/columbia-county-reptiles-and-amphibians

We’d appreciate any photos you have of snakes, lizards, frogs, salamanders, or turtles from anywhere in Columbia County, but unusual species and sightings away from the main cities are especially desirable. We’re happy to answer any questions you have about the observations we’re looking for and how the data will be used.

I’ll leave you with a short video of Sophia’s interactions with a garter snake. Just so you know, there are no dangerous snakes in Columbia County. Kids who aren’t taught to be afraid of snakes interact with them quite naturally and it’s safer than playing with a puppy.

Thanks for reading, and happy herping!