Mr. Joseph T. Collins This is Me

Education

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1. 1. www.cincinnatimagazine.com

   www.cincinnatimagazine.com/arc - [Cached]

   Published on: 3/13/2008   Last Visited: 3/13/2008

   AGREEMENT ON THIS comes from Joseph T. Collins of Lawrence, Kansas, a self-described lifelong "lizard chaser."
   
   "It's inevitable that they'd proliferate in Cincinnati," says Collins, herpetologist emeritus at the University of Kansas and currently working withthe Kansas Biological Survey.Collins would know these things, as coauthor of The Peterson Field Guide to Reptiles and Amphibians of Eastern/Central North America, and other more scholarly works.Collins says that as a kid, he was fascinated by the Lazarus lizards.
   ...
   Gist and Collins agree that most species introduced into a new habitat will eventually have some "unintended negative effect on wildlife or vegetation."

2. 2. Southeastern Gecko Found in Kansas | HoumaToday.com | The Courier | Houma, LA

   www.houmatoday.com/apps/pbcs.d - [Cached]

   Published on: 7/10/2006   Last Visited: 7/10/2006

   The gecko was found in Overland Park by students of Kansas naturalist Joe Collins of Lawrence.Herpetologists have confirmed that the Mediterranean gecko is taking up residence in the state, spreading north from the southeast United States over the past decade. (AP Photo/Lawrence Journal-World/Mike Yoder)
   ...
   "We knew it got as far as Norman, Oklahoma, in the early 1990s," said Joe Collins, University of Kansas herpetologist.
   ...
   Collins said there were sightings late last year in Johnson County.He was asked in May about the gecko after someone caught the lizard, which Collins had previously seen and caught in Texas and Florida.
   
   Just to make sure it was a gecko, Collins took a picture of the lizard and sent it to Walter Meshaka Jr., the state herpetologist for Pennsylvania and a renowned expert on geckos.
   ...
   "They'd go up and hang around the lights and eat dinner," Collins said."It's sort of a smorgasbord for geckos."
   
   The geckos are generally about 4 inches long and can blend in with their surroundings.Common in southern Europe and northern Africa, geckos probably arrived in Florida by way of ships, then migrated or hitched rides aboard vehicles to other states, Collins said.
   
   "I didn't think they would make it this far north because it's too cold," Collins said."Apparently, the little fellows learned how to live outside during the summer and run inside during the winter and live off whatever spiders and cockroaches they can find in buildings."
   
   Geckos are friendly creatures and make good pets, Collins said.
   
   "They are fairly easy animals to keep, and that's probably why they naturalize to a lot of different areas," she said.
   
   The Mediterranean gecko is the third "alien" gecko to migrate to Kansas, Collins said.The other two are the Italian wall lizard and western green lacerta, both found around Topeka.The wall lizard also can be found in Lawrence, he said.

3. 3. Having Fun with Snakes - Gulf County Florida news story from StarFL.com, The Star

   www.starfl.com/article.cfm?ID= - [Cached]

   Published on: 2/3/2005   Last Visited: 2/8/2005

   Parents, Joe Collins said, ask him all the time whether it's all right for their child to keep a snake as a pet.
   
   Is a slithery length of ick suitable for a child to keep?
   
   "I tell them they could be doing other things," Collins said with a small laugh, leaving those other behavioral possibilities to be filled in by the imagination.
   
   And those parents, Collins noted, consistently reply, "Yeah, maybe they can keep a snake."
   
   A snake can keep kids focused on more constructive habits, Collins said, and actually make quite suitable companions in a variety of settings.
   
   Snakes, Collins said, are "some of the greatest animals in schools today" and are ideal for the classroom, at home or as a mascot for a Boy Scout troop.
   
   There is very little maintenance, other than feeding them from time to time.And kids can learn a lot by interacting with the snake, watching it eat, watching it shed its skin.
   
   And when they are bored, just return the snake to the wild where it will seek out any number of places to hide.
   
   Collins provided a glimpse into snakes and other reptiles and amphibians during one of a series of talks at the St. Joseph Bay Preserves Center.
   
   A world-renowned herpetologist, Collins, a professor emeritus at the University of Kansas, comes to this neck of the woods to survey the diversity of herp species each year.
   
   "You live in one of those areas where there is a lot of diversity," Collins said."There is a wide variety of harmless animals you can find in the Panhandle if you look for them and the binoculars are out of the trees.
   
   "I wonder what percentage of snake bites relate to bird watching?"
   
   But snake bites, Collins added, are extremely rare.
   
   For starters snakes like to hide under things.
   
   To get rid of the snakes in your yard or property, just clean it.
   
   "They hide under things," Collins said.
   ...
   Collins agreed that most bites occur when someone is playing around with the animals, because, in large measure, snakes find us about as ominous as we find the slithery creatures.
   ...
   "The incidence of people who die from a venomous snake bite is very low," Collins said.
   
   The main issue is pain, pain which, Collins noted, will cause a person to create plenty of new English word combinations.
   
   Pain which will make a person wish for the onset of death.
   
   But, Collins cautioned, the bite, in the long run, is only the beginning of the pain.
   
   "The most painful part of a venomous snake bite -daytime television," Collins said of the two times he was forced into a hospital bed for a snake bite.
   
   Tallahassee Memorial Hospital, he further noted, is the best in the region for the treatment of snake bites, which regardless of the relative chances of death should be treated immediately.
   ...
   Unlike bird watching, Collins said, searching for herps - this year he and his team have identified 53 species - is hard work.
   
   Wear stiff, heavy gloves, he said.
   
   Always keep the item you are lifting to look for creatures between you and whatever is underneath.
   
   "Your ability to stay in the gene pool is enhanced," Collins said.
   
   Collins also noted that unlike with flora, there is very little invasive fauna in the area.
   
   He knew of just two creatures, the greenhouse frog, which arrived from Key West, and a Mediterranean gecko, as non-native to this area.
   
   "They are the only ones that I know of that aren't supposed to be here, and that's a good thing," Collins said.