Episode 75: Herping with Kids Panel Discussion

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Hello everyone and welcome to Episode Seventy Five! It’s the day after Christmas, and I hope you all are safe, healthy, and warm. The temperatures at my house are back into the mid-teens Fahrenheit, after a few blustery and frigid days leading up to the holiday.  I’m working to crank out a few episodes over the next week or so before I head to Peru for another visit.

I want to give a big shout-out to Dick and Patti Bartlett, the show’s newest patrons.  I appreciate your one-time contribution and I really enjoyed spending a little time with you two earlier this year.  And a happy new year to you both.

And as always, I want to say thank you to all of the show’s patrons!  I’m grateful for everyone’s contributions and it does keep the show rolling along. And if you’re out there listening and you would like to kick in a few bucks, it’s easy to do, you simply go to the So Much Pingle Patreon page. You can support the show for as little as three bucks a month – less than a fancy cup of coffee! You can also support the show via one-time contributions via PayPal or Venmo (please contact me via email to somuchpingle@gmail.com).

Now let’s turn our attention to the show.  I want to thank Jason Folt for suggesting this topic, leading to me talking with him, Mike Rochford, and Liz Hughes about the challenges and rewards of getting the little kiddos out there in herp land.  And of course, I have many other friends doing much the same and I was thinking about you all as well as we had this discussion, and again as I put this together.

Thanks for listening everyone! And as always, please keep the comments and suggestions coming, and please take time to rate the show on your podcast platform! The show email is somuchpingle@gmail.com, and there’s also a So Much Pingle group on Facebook, for discussion, comments, feedback, suggestions, herp confessions, entertainment partitioning ideas, tips for herping better, etc.

-Mike

 

 

 

Episode 74: Origin Stories VI with Stacey and Kim

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Hello everyone and welcome to Episode Seventy Four! I want to wish you all a happy and peaceful holiday season.

I have shoutouts to some new patrons of the show!  Ian Kanda, thanks so much for your one-time contribution.  Ian is strictly listening to the show in order so hopefully he’ll hear my shout-out before the fourth of July.  I have some new Patreoners as well!  Kim Brown, thank you so much and your timing is rather excellent!  And a special shout-out to Ruth and Henry, who love to go herping with their dad Andrew Davis.  That makes me happy (and thanks for the nice note Andrew, and for supporting the show). I appreciate y’all.

As always, I want to say thank you to all of the show’s patrons!  I’m grateful for everyone’s contributions and it does keep the show rolling along. And if you’re out there listening and you would like to kick in a few bucks, it’s easy to do, you simply go to the So Much Pingle Patreon page. You can support the show for as little as three bucks a month – less than a fancy cup of coffee! You can also support the show via one-time contributions via PayPal or Venmo (please contact me via email to somuchpingle@gmail.com).

I also want to give Kris Haas a shoutout for both his kind words and some very thoughtful comments, thank you sir.  I do like hearing from folks – your thoughts, opinions, guest suggestions, whatever you got.  You can email me at somuchpingle@gmail.com.  Also please note that I am on Instagram, been there a long while now, but I’m also on Post dot News, and Mastodon now, under the SoMuchPingle handle. 

This week we’ve got our sixth installment of Origin Stories, and this episode features Stacey Schenkel and Kim Brown.  I owe Stacey a bit of an apology because it took me a while to get this one put together – I think we recorded her segment at the end of February.  And then I traveled a bunch and went back to work, and didn’t get a bookend interview recorded until this fall with Kim, and so this project got a little dusty.  But I like how this one turned out, I think Stacey and Kim pair well together.

Thanks for listening everyone! And as always, please keep the comments and suggestions coming, and please take time to rate the show on your podcast platform! The show email is somuchpingle@gmail.com, and there’s also a So Much Pingle group on Facebook, for discussion, comments, feedback, suggestions, herp confessions, tips for herping better, etc.

-Mike

Episode 73: Life Underfoot with Zach Truelock

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Hello everyone and welcome to Episode Seventy Three! Tomorrow is Thanksgiving here in the US and I wish everyone a good holiday.  It’s good to be back in the studio again after a few weeks off.

As always, I want to say thank you to all of the show’s patrons!  I’m grateful for everyone’s contributions and it does keep the show rolling along. And if you’re out there listening and you would like to kick in a few bucks, it’s easy to do, you simply go to the So Much Pingle Patreon page. You can support the show for as little as three bucks a month – less than a fancy cup of coffee! You can also support the show via one-time contributions via PayPal or Venmo (please contact me via email to somuchpingle@gmail.com).

Our guest this week is Zach Truelock, an Indiana native who is currently doing some very important conservation work in Florida.  Zach has been involved with a number of very cool herp conservation projects over the past few years, and also a co-creator for the Life Underfoot YouTube channel.  I want to highlight a few links for Life Underfoot, some of which we talk about in the episode:

Can We Save North America’s Rarest Salamander?

Spotted Salamanders In A Vernal Pool

Timber Rattlesnake Male Combat

Jefferson’s Salamanders

Thanks for listening everyone! And as always, please keep the comments and suggestions coming, and please take time to rate the show on your podcast platform! The show email is somuchpingle@gmail.com, and there’s also a So Much Pingle group on Facebook, for discussion, comments, feedback, suggestions, herp confessions, tips for herping better, etc.

-Mike

 

Episode 72: Weird Tales from the Field

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Hello everyone and welcome to Episode Seventy Two!  It’s the day before Halloween, an appropriate time to release these tales of strange occurrences from the world of field herping.

As always, I want to say thank you to all of the show’s patrons, including our newest Patreon member Brad Allen!  Thank you so much Brad, and I appreciated your note as well.  I’m grateful for everyone’s contributions and it does keep the show rolling along. And if you’re out there listening and you would like to kick in a few bucks, it’s easy to do, you simply go to the So Much Pingle Patreon page. You can support the show for as little as three bucks a month – less than a fancy cup of coffee! You can also support the show via one-time contributions via PayPal or Venmo (please contact me via email to somuchpingle@gmail.com).

This week’s show came out of a suggestion from someone (I can’t recall who) last fall to do a show on the weird/creepy/spooky/unusual things that happen out in the field.  I began soliciting stories and recorded the first of them back in January, and the last was recorded a few weeks ago.  I want to say thanks to everyone who contributed to this episode – Matt Ratcliffe, Jake Scott and his alleged litter robot, John Burris, Tim Warfel, Matt Cage, Jeff Martineau, Rob Kreutzer, Pat Kain, and Bryan Hughes.  I also want to thank the folks who sent in stories that I couldn’t include for one reason or another.

Thanks for listening everyone! And as always, please keep the comments and suggestions coming, and please take time to rate the show on your podcast platform! The show email is somuchpingle@gmail.com, and there’s also a So Much Pingle group on Facebook, for discussion, comments, feedback, suggestions, herp confessions, lifting curses cast by Hungarian witches, tips for herping better, etc.

-Mike

Episode 71: Talking Tuatara with Sarah Lamar

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Hello everyone and welcome to Episode Seventy One!  Here it is, mid-October and the fall rains are soaking us here at SMP world headquarters.

As always, I want to say thank you to all of the show’s patrons, including Brandon Bourassa, who came in at one Patreon level and recently went up to the next level – thank you Brandon, I appreciate that.  I also want to give a shout out to our newest patron, Christian Diederich, who made a one-time contribution via Venmo.  Thank you so much, Christian, and it was fun hearing about your recent experiences with rainbow snakes.  Christian spotted a neonate rainbow snake while driving 55 on a highway at night, which is pretty cool.  It got me thinking about my own rainbow snake sighting, which was 25 years ago and I haven’t seen one since.  It was suggested that maybe I should herp better.

I took a peek at some of the show’s stats this week, I don’t do this often, because it’s easy to obsess over numbers and guess what?  42 thousand listens to date.  I think that’s an amazing number and I appreciate everyone’s help in getting here.

Our show this week features a conversation with Sarah Lamar, a doctoral candidate at the Victoria University of Wellington in Wellington, New Zealand.  It’s amazing to me that I can talk with someone on the other side of the planet with relatively little effort at all.  Sarah’s research brings her into close contact with those amazing rhynchocephalians (see photo) and I thoroughly enjoyed our talk.

Thanks for coming on the show, Sarah!  It was so much fun.  And thanks for listening everyone! And as always, please keep the comments and suggestions coming, and please take time to rate the show on your podcast platform! The show email is somuchpingle@gmail.com, and there’s also a So Much Pingle group on Facebook, for discussion, comments, feedback, suggestions, herp confessions, methods for opening your third eye, tips for herping better, etc.

Cheers! Mike

Episode 70: Panel Talk with Some Illinois Bois

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Hello everyone and welcome to Episode Seventy!  It’s nearly October and I hope all of you remain safe and healthy out there. It’s good to be talking with you all again after a bit of a gap – I had a lot on my plate for the past few weeks.  You’re probably thinking that an old retired guy ought to have plenty of free time, and usually that is true enough.  But I recently started doing some half-time consulting work for my old department at the university, and I’ll be working there for just a few months or so.  A temporary thing, I have no desire to rekindle a career.  So thanks for your patience while I worked all of that out and got started.

As always, a big thank you to all of the show’s supporters – there are costs associated with running any entertainment channel and I am grateful to all of you for keeping this little boat afloat.  And if you’re out there listening and you would like to kick in a few bucks, it’s easy to do, you simply go to the So Much Pingle Patreon page. You can support the show for as little as three bucks a month – less than a fancy cup of coffee! You can also support the show via one-time contributions via PayPal or Venmo (please contact me via email to somuchpingle@gmail.com).

Here we go with another panel discussion show!  I haven’t done one in a while, and I came up with the notion of getting a group together to talk about herping in my home state.  Jeremy Schumacher and Justin Michels return to the microphone for this, and I’m happy that Joey Cavataio agreed to join us, so we’ve got representation from the north, south, east, and west corners of the state.

Thanks Jeremy, Justin and Joey – it was fun chatting with the three of you.  And thanks for listening everyone! And as always, please keep the comments and suggestions coming, and please take time to rate the show on your podcast platform! The show email is somuchpingle@gmail.com, and there’s also a So Much Pingle group on Facebook, for discussion, comments, feedback, suggestions, herp confessions, dolomite prairies near you, tips for herping better, etc.

Cheers! Mike

Episode 69: The Guest Host – Host Guest Episode

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Hello everyone and welcome to Episode Sixty Nine!  And for the first time, we have a guest host, Josh Holbrook, who graciously agreed to turn things around and ask me some questions.  Since I started the podcast, I have received many requests along the lines of “I wanna hear someone interview YOU!”.  I figured I would just keep putting this off but okay, here it is!  Like most people I’m not entirely comfortable talking about myself but Josh made things easy and we rolled along for almost two hours.  This interview was conducted in June of 2022 at the Santa Cruz field station near Iquitos, Peru.

As always, I want to take a minute to thank all of the show’s patrons – there are costs associated with running any entertainment channel and I am grateful to all of you for keeping this little boat afloat.  And if you’re out there listening and you would like to kick in a few bucks, it’s easy to do, you simply go to the So Much Pingle Patreon page. You can support the show for as little as three bucks a month – less than a fancy cup of coffee! You can also support the show via one-time contributions via PayPal or Venmo (please contact me via email to somuchpingle@gmail.com).

Thanks again Josh, for the great interview!

And thanks for listening everyone! And as always, please keep the comments and suggestions coming, and please take time to rate the show on your podcast platform! The show email is somuchpingle@gmail.com, and there’s also a So Much Pingle group on Facebook, for discussion, comments, feedback, suggestions, herp confessions,, tips for herping better, etc.

Cheers! Mike

 

Episode 68: Herp Science Sunday with Dr. Alex Krohn and Coen Hird

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Hello everyone and welcome to Episode Sixty Eight!  Here we are in mid-August and I hope all of you remain safe and healthy out there. I’ve been working on re-siding and painting my garage all week, and it feels good to scrub the paint from my hands and strap into the podcasting chair for a bit.

Now before we get to the show notes portion of the show notes, I want to take a minute to thank all of the show’s patrons, including our newest Patreon supporters, Wes Redridge, and Lawrence Erickson!  Thank you so much, Wes and Lawrence!  And as always, a big thank you to all of the show’s supporters – there are costs associated with running any entertainment channel and I am grateful to all of you for keeping this little boat afloat.  And if you’re out there listening and you would like to kick in a few bucks, it’s easy to do, you simply go to the So Much Pingle Patreon page. You can support the show for as little as three bucks a month – less than a fancy cup of coffee! You can also support the show via one-time contributions via PayPal or Venmo (please contact me via email to somuchpingle@gmail.com).

Excellent photo courtesy of Ben Revell.

Episode 68 happens to be another installment of Herp Science Sunday with my pal Dr. Alex Krohn and features Coen Hird, a doctoral candidate from the University of Queensland in Brisbane. This episode came about because Alex saw a tweet from Coen about a paper that he co-authored, concerning a certain species of pobblebonk, in this case the Northern Banjo Frog, Limnodynastes terrareginae.  Love that name, pobblebonk, and there are more than one species of frogs under the pobblebonk umbrella.  So anyway, Alex pings me right away about this paper as a great candidate for Herp Science Sunday, and Coen was keen to come on the show, so here we are.  The title of the paper is:

“The role of environmental calcium in the extreme acid tolerance of northern banjo frog (Limnodynastes terraereginae) larvae”

I’ve added a link so that you can click on the title and get access. And as always, you can drop me a note and I will send you a PDF copy of the paper.

Also – the teaser at the beginning of the show is a short clip of some pobblebonks calling, and the clip comes from some recordings I purchased from a company called Wild Ambience. Long story short, I got 45 minutes of pobblebonks and cool birds and other nature sounds for about 8 bucks U.S.  So THIS is an unsolicited and yet much deserved plug from me – check out wildambience and maybe you’ll hear something you like.

Thank you Alex and Coen!  That was a fun show.  And thanks for listening everyone! And as always, please keep the comments and suggestions coming, and please take time to rate the show on your podcast platform! The show email is somuchpingle@gmail.com, and there’s also a So Much Pingle group on Facebook, for discussion, comments, feedback, suggestions, herp confessions,, tips for herping better, etc.

Cheers! Mike

Episode 67: Release the Benders!

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Hello everyone and welcome to Episode Sixty Seven!  It’s the end of July and I hope all of you remain safe and healthy out there.

As always, I want to thank all of the patrons of the show – we would not be kicking off a third season without you and I appreciate your support.  To others in the listening audience, if you like the show, please consider supporting it via the So Much Pingle Patreon page. You can support the show for as little as three buck a month – less than a fancy cup of coffee!  You can also support the show via one-time contributions via PayPal or Venmo (please contact me via email to somuchpingle@gmail.com).

Many of you have heard my interview with Nick Burgmeier about his work with hellbenders in Indiana.  That was Episode 8, way back in season 1, and I didn’t just pull Nick’s name out of a hat for that interview.  I had the privilege of helping out with hellbender surveys as far back as 2007, with my buddies Don Becker and Greg Stephens, and little did I know that all of that preliminary work would lead to the current hellbender raise-and-release project going on in Indiana.  And to provide just a bit more detail, these are young adult hellbenders that are being released, they are raised from eggs collected in the wild in Kentucky and Ohio.  This is necessary because Indiana hellbenders are in trouble – the state has a small population of adult hellbenders and if there are any eggs being produced, they haven’t been located.   Thankfully these days there’s a lot of cooperation between various agencies in states with hellbenders, so there’s a lot of dedicated work to keep these awesome creatures in as many rivers as possible.

This show was recorded in the field and since I knew we would be spending time in the water, I didn’t use my standard field rig.  I captured everything on my Zoom HN4 recorder, which is my backup recorder these days.  I used the unit’s built-in omni-directional microphone and so I captured everything – water noises, buckets, lots of banter and yakking, and sometimes multiple conversations happening in parallel.  But I was able to record the event as it happened, and there’s a lot of running commentary from Nick and others that help to set the scene, and all of the banter – well, that’s just a lot of happy people taking part in a joyous event.

Acknowledgements:  First of all, special thanks to my friend Nick Burgmeier – Project coordinator and all-around good guy, and Marci Skelton, Nature Nick’s spouse and his number one fan. Shelby Roberts – AKA Bender Baby Mama, thanks for all of your work and for talking with me. Summer Brown, Madison Phillips and Zach Truelock were on hand to make sure everything went smoothly, and let’s not forget Thomas Coggeshall, holding down the fort back at the lab. I want to also thank Jarrett Manek for transporting us around and for the great behind the scenes tour at O’Bannon Woods. Other witnesses for this event include Don Becker, Greg Stephens, Justin Michels, Jeff and May Faircloth, John Burris and Jeremiah Jonothan.  It was great to be there with you all.

Thanks for listening everyone! And as always, please keep the comments and suggestions coming, and please take time to rate the show on your podcast platform! The show email is somuchpingle@gmail.com, and there’s also a So Much Pingle group on Facebook, for discussion, comments, feedback, suggestions, herp confessions, pet names for Hellbenders, tips for herping better, etc.

Cheers! Mike

 

Episode 66: Herp Adventures in China with Kevin Messenger

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Photo by Kevin Messenger.

Hello everyone and welcome to Episode Sixty Six!  It’s good to be back in the studio, and I hope all of you remain safe and healthy out there.  It’s mid-summer here at SMP world headquarters and I’m back after a week off to get some work done around the house.

As always, I want to thank all of the patrons of the show – we would not be kicking off a third season without you and I appreciate your support.  To others in the listening audience, if you like the show, please consider supporting it via the So Much Pingle Patreon page. You can support the show for as little as three buck a month – less than a fancy cup of coffee!  You can also support the show via one-time contributions via PayPal or Venmo (please contact me via email to somuchpingle@gmail.com).

This week it’s my great pleasure to talk with Dr. Kevin Messenger.  Kevin is a professor at Nanjing Forestry University in China.  I’ve known Kevin for a number of years and we’ve spent some time in the field, and he and his dad came down to Peru on one of our tours a few years ago.  Anyone involved with field herping for a while is familiar with Kevin’s China posts on the old Field Herp Forum.  Of course, we talk about those posts, but Kevin has more awesome cards up his sleeve, including his discovery of multiple new herp species in China, and his book on the rat snakes of China.  I hope you enjoy our conversation as much as I did, and here are some important links to Kevin’s work (and play):

Kevin’s post on Field Herp Forum – “A New Species of Kurixalus Treefrog!”

A link to the paper in which Kevin and his colleagues describe the new Kurixalus treefrog

Another paper we discussed where Kevin and colleagues describe a new species of Megophrys

Kevin’s list of publications on ResearchGate

Let’s not forget about Kevin’s new book, “The Asian Ratsnakes and Kin of Greater China”.  You can find the softbound copy on Amazon.com, or go to Lulu.com if you prefer a hardbound edition.  I’m a big fan of this book and I hope you enjoy it as much as i do.

One more thing – you can search Kevin’s name on YouTube and find his channel, which includes the “Baby Monkeys Playing in China” video (currently with 55m views).

Thanks for coming on the show, Kevin!  It was good to talk with you again.  And thanks for listening everyone! And as always, please keep the comments and suggestions coming, and please take time to rate the show on your podcast platform! The show email is somuchpingle@gmail.com, and there’s also a So Much Pingle group on Facebook, for discussion, comments, feedback, suggestions, herp confessions, frog call recording, tips for herping better, etc.

Cheers! Mike