MHS News

RAD Zoo public facility permanently shuttering!

The Reptile and Amphibian Discovery Zoo (RAD Zoo) will be closing its public facility at the Medford Outlet mall on January 1, 2025. As part of this process, they are looking for good homes for many of their animals! On Sunday, December 1 from 1 to 5pm, they will be having an animal adoption day, along with a zoo exhibit and infrastructure sale at the zoo. Not all of the zoo’s animals will be available for adoption. They are going to be continuing their traveling reptile programs, so they are saving many animals, but will have a large number of…

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MHS General Meeting has Moved!

Starting on December 6, 2024, and running through all of 2025, MHS meetings will now be held at the Harriet Alexander Nature Center (HANC) in Roseville, just a few miles from our current meeting site. The building is nestled on the edge of 52 acres of marsh, prairie and forest habitat. A brief walk on a paved path leads through beautiful woods from the parking lot to the front door. (People with mobility issues or large items can be driven to the door and dropped off before parking.) Members may enjoy walking on the extensive boardwalk that winds through the…

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2025 Board of Directors Elect

As of November 2025 General Meeting Election, on an unopposed ballot, the following have been elected: President: Renee Valois,Vice President: April Homich,Recording Secretary: Christopher Rueber,Membership Secretary: Sophie Faacks,Newsletter Editor: Nancy Haig,Treasurer: Rae Rueber,Member at Large: Dan Snorek,Member at Large: Crystal Welle,Member at Large: TJ Carlson,Member at Large: Unfilled

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May ’22 Speaker: Erica Hoaglund – The Endangered Blanchard’s Cricket Frog

Erica Hoaglund has worked for over 15 years with herps and other animals through the Nongame Wildlife Program of the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. She covers Region 3/Central, which includes about 26 counties.               On May 6th, she spoke to the MHS about a new joint project with HerpMapper, aimed at putting community science to work documenting Minnesota’s only endangered amphibian, the Blanchard’s cricket frog. Her talk covered the frog’s status and history, phenology, habitat and ecology, distribution, how to identify the species, and a new citizen science survey seeking help from MHS…

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April ’22 Speaker: Gaea Crozier – Wood Turtle Research in Northeastern Minnesota

Gaea Crozier of the MN DNR is a nongame wildlife biologist out of Grand Rapids who works with wood turtles (Glyptemys insculpta) and other creatures. She spoke for the MHS General Meeting on April 1st about the results of a recently completed project on wood turtles in northeastern Minnesota through MN DNR’s Nongame Wildlife Program. The project examined threats to the turtles and the effectiveness of management aimed at addressing those threats. Crozier also spoke about current efforts related to wood turtles in northeastern Minnesota.               Wood turtles are a threatened species in Minnesota, ranging over the eastern portion of…

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October ’17 Speaker: Beth Girard; Lizards: What They Do and How They Do It!

Beth has been an active member of the Minnesota Herpetological Society since 1999. This year, she served as the 2017 State Fair Coordinator and continues her role as the current Adoption Chair.  She joined MHS with her four children when we moved to the Twin Cities from Orlando, Florida.  It was her love of everything herp and work as an informal science educator that fuels her passion for squamates. Now that her kids have grown up and moved on, there are still plenty of animals at her house!  Last year she was asked to do a 2-hour lizards and dragons…

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March ’17 Speaker: Aquatic Newt Husbandry; Wild Salamander Threats

Bradley Wilson has been fascinated by the oft-overlooked newt since he first heard of such a creature in a Monty Python movie his father showed him in the early 1980’s.  His parents home quickly became filled with aquariums and terrariums.  Freshwater community tanks, oddballs such as the now outlawed fish Snakeheads, lungfish, freshwater toadfish, lionfish and moray eels. Saltwater tanks housing Volitan Lionfish, Tangs, Triggers and more moray eels.  Guinea pigs, teddy bear hamsters, ferrets, rabbits all made a home with him at one point or another.  At one point he owned a Cayenne river caecilian; which met an unfortunate…

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October ’16 Talk: The Great Herp Extinction: What We Know (And What We Can Do) About the World’s Vanishing Herps

Jeremy Hance is a freelance environmental journalist. Currently he is a senior correspondent with Monagabay and writes a blog on the Guardian entitled Radical Conservation. He has been covering wildlife conservation issues, including the rising tide of mass extinction, since 2007. In pursuit of his stories, Jeremy has traveled to nearly thirty countries across five continents. He is also the author of a book of essays entitled, Life is Good: Conservation in an Age of Mass Extinction. You can follow him on Facebook or Twitter @jeremy_hance.

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Herps in the News

13′ Python Seized

13-foot Python seized After Owner Admits He was Unprepared for Snakes Rapid Growth
The Environment Conservation Police (ECO) seized a 13-foot Burmese python from a N.Y. home

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