Herper of the Month - December 2005
"I have been interested in herps since I caught my first snake at the age of five or six. I was outside playing with some kids on my front porch when one of us spotted a snake slowly crawling towards us along the foundation of my home. I remember one kid saying, "It's a rattlesnake", and another saying "No, it's a cobra". I said, "No it's not", and walked over and picked it up. I believe that first snake was a melanistic wandering garter snake. I was mad when my sister made me let it go but I think trying to find that snake again is what got me into herping. As I moved around Utah, we always had wandering garter snakes in our neighborhoods. We never saw any other herps in suburban Utah, but strangely I never grow tired of seeing them." |
| "I
never saw any amphibians until our family moved east to Masachussetts
and then Ohio. These places made me quite fond of trudging through
creeks in tenis shoes looking for frogs and snakes. I found my
first frogs and turtles in Massachusetts. When we moved to Ohio
where I found my first salamanders and a greater variety of snakes
than I had ever seen in one place. We often found northern water
snakes queen snakes and garter snakes in the ponds and streams
near our house. Ohio seemed like a paradise for herping and fishing
to me. When my family moved back to Utah I was very saddened by
the thought that I would only be able to find wandering garter
snakes again. As I grew more mobile via a bicycle and got involved
with scouting, I was able to visit more places outside of the
suburban garter snake haven I lived in and I was thus able to
find more herp species. Herping in Utah was much more frustrating
than it had been back east however. Utah is not a good place to
find things under cover but that didn't stop me from trying." |
| "After
several years of working full time and going to school full time
I graduated with a Bachelors degree in computer science. Suddenly,
I had had more free time on my hands. I chose to spend this free
time in nature and my love of herps quickly returned. From the
time of my renuied interest about 5 years ago, I have been on
a quest to find and photograph all of the reptiles and amphibians
of Utah in their natural habitat. I am almost done with this silly
quest. Utah has a lot of edge range species due to the fact that
it is the meeting point of four different ecological zones, the
Great Basin desert, Mojave desert, Colorado plateau, and the Rocky
Mountains. This means a lot of long trips to different corners
of the state in persuit of these species. I have had many frustrating
and expensive trips in the last five years but I think I have
learned a lot. I have been to many different places in the US
but I don't think any other state can match Utah in its geographical
diversity and beauty." |
| "I have been working on an online field guide to the reptiles and amphibians of Utah. I hope to be finished with it by the end of this comming winter. I may try to do a book version as well. Over the last 3-4 years I have spent a great deal of time working with the Utah Division of Wildlife resources trying to make more sensible herp laws. Hopefully the fruit of that work will be ripening in the next couple of months." |
"I
have a wife and two daughters. I enjoy herping most when my family
is with me. I have been dragging my daughters on excursions since
they were a month or so old. There haven't been many times in the
past four years when I or my wife hasn't had one of them on our
back and they've both been able to hike a couple of miles by the
time they were two. I don't think its ever too soon to open childrens
eyes to the marvels of nature. I love to see my girls learn and
take an interest in things which aren't man made. I also enjoy herping
by myself as it gives me time to reflect on my life, my priorities,
and God's creations. To me, herping is a time to get away from the
world of getting and spending. William Wordsworth said it best in
his poem, "The World is Too Much With Us".
"The
World is too much with us; late and soon, |
© Scott Waters Productions 2005