Wolverines, Anacondas, Raccoons Join New York’s ‘Dangerous Animals’ List - Regulation would create new licensing requirements for zoos, wildlife parks, exhibitions – via Herp Digest

By Melanie Grayce West 

Sept. 19, 2019 Wall Street Journal

Badgers and boomslang snakes would seem to be dangerous animals to the average New Yorker.

State environmental officials now want to make it an official designation.

On Thursday, the New York state Department of Environmental Conservation released proposed regulations that would expand the state’s list of "dangerous animals.” The regulation would create new licensing requirements for zoos, wildlife parks and exhibitions that have those animals.

The proposal includes 17 different categories of animals that could pose a threat to public safety. The list includes the usual suspects like wolverines, raccoons and the Eurasian lynx, plus the obscure and less fuzzy: the DeSchauensee’s anaconda; and the Nile monitor, a large lizard with a nasty demeanor. Elephants are on the list, too.

The state already considered some animals dangerous, including wolves and coyotes, and by law individuals can’t keep exotic animals as pets. Exhibition operators, such as animal parks or zoos, are already required to be licensed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture for the most dangerous animals.

However, the state said that to ensure the safety of people, fish and wildlife populations, it needed additional powers. The public will have time to comment on the proposed regulation before it goes into effect.

Jeff Taylor, who owns the Wild Animal Park in Chittenango, N.Y., said the state’s move amounted to overregulation for legally licensed operators. His park has several of the dangerous animals, including bears.

“People already breaking the law aren’t going to follow it,” he said. “It’s making it more of a permit process for us.”

Conservation officials point to a growing number of incidents with dangerous animals, including one in June where an Orange County man was bitten by one of the more than 150 venomous snakes he kept in his basement. In 2011, a New York woman died after being bitten by an African black mamba snake and in 2006, a New York woman was attacked by a capuchin monkey, the DEC says.

Sue McDonough, president of  the animal-rights advocacy group New York State Humane Association, said such designations were needed to combat “roadside zoos” that are unlicensed, and to address people who keep wild animals as pets.

“You have people getting wildlife as pets without any training or background in handling wild animals and it is a problem,” she said.

Rangers wrangle hundreds of critters in New York city parks - Record Numbers of Animals in Central Park Alone-274 Raccoons, Birds Snappers and red-eared sliders. – via Herp Digest

By Melissa Klein 

September 21, 2019 NY Post

(From reports from readers of HD, this menagerie of animals in city parks is not uncommon across the US. Especially red-eared sliders.)

It’s an urban jungle out there.

Park rangers handled 748 sick, misplaced or dead animals spotted in city parks — ranging from 451 raccoons to four coyotes to one Dutch blue love bird, according to city data from May 2, 2018, to June 12, 2019.

The critters range from the everyday city pigeons and domestic dogs and cats to an alligator snapping turtle in Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx and a harbor seal found dead on Staten Island.

Central Park logged the most wildlife reports, with 274 birds, turtles and raccoons — many of which suffered from the canine distemper virus that makes them act like zombies.

Across the city, 155 critters were considered healthy, 451 unhealthy or injured and 104 dead on arrival. Conditions were not known for all.

The urban park rangers respond to calls from the public, park employees or others who have spotted an animal that looks sick or out of place. Sometimes the animal has wandered away by the time they arrive — 232 animal reports were deemed “unfounded,” including one for a boa constrictor someone claimed to have spotted in Morningside Park. 

The rangers determine if the animal needs to be rescued or left alone.

“Often we believe the best thing for the animal is to not interfere, and we generally only escalate to a rescue if the animal appears injured or sick,” said Meghan Lalor, a Parks Department spokeswoman.

The city sometimes calls in wildlife rehabilitators like Long Island-based Bobby Horvath.

“Squirrels, woodchucks, opossums, even a beaver,” Horvath said. “We’ve had snapping turtles, too.” Some go to a vet, but Horvarth said he does the long-term care at his home. When healthy, they are driven back to a city park.

The nonprofit Wild Bird Fund has also answered the call for injured or abandoned animals, including many young squirrels, said Rita McMahon, the group’s director

.

“They’re scrambling about before they’re ready to be on their own,” McMahon said. “They will sometimes fall. They smash their face … mostly they just get a bloody nose.”

Domestic ducks — likely discarded pets — usually go to an upstate farm.

“They live in a glorious barn that’s heated in the winter … It’s a very nice set-up,” McMahon said.

New York man charged in largest seizure of illegal reptiles in state history, officials say – via Herp Digest

BY ABC News Radio | July 5, 2019

New York State Department of Environmental Conservation

(ALLEGANY, N.Y.) — A 71-year-old New York man faces a slew of charges after officials seized hundreds of turtles and three king cobras from his home, authorities said.

The seizure is believed to be the largest illegal reptiles bust in New York state history.

New York State Department of Environmental Conservation Commissioner Basil Seggos announced Wednesday that William Engelder, 71, of Allegany, was charged with reckless endangerment, illegal sale of wildlife, overdriving, torturing and injuring animals, illegal possession and transportation of venomous reptiles, illegal possession of wild animals as pets and possessing an endangered species without a permit, among other offenses.

State wildlife officers seized the reptiles while conducting a search warrant at Engelder’s home last August after receiving a tip about a man harboring illegal animals, according to a press release from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation.

Among the reptiles authorities say were illegally housed at the residence were three king cobras, the longest venomous snake in the world, and six Gila monsters, a species of venomous lizard.

There were also 184 spotted turtles, 53 wood turtles, 28 Blanding’s turtles, 17 bog turtles, which is a critically endangered species native to New York, six snapping turtles and two painted turtles.

If convicted on all charges, Engelder faces up to a maximum fine of $104,000 and up to 33 years in prison.

Snakes on a Train, Yo’: Video Shows Snake Slithering on L Train NYC Subway) Reptilian straphanger or rat exterminator? - via Herp Digest

Video at :

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/NYC-Snakes-on-a-Train-Video-Snake-Slithering-on-L-Train-Subway-Car-431425003.html

You can now add snake to the wide variety of people, animals and microorganisms that have come in contact with the city’s subway poles.

A straphanger captured a snake wrapped around a rail handle on an L train in a video that has gone viral.

In the video, the snake is wrapped around the pole with its head stretched out towards the ceiling.

A man can be heard quietly saying, “Snakes on a train, yo, snakes on a train,” as the camera zooms in on the wriggling reptile.

It appears as though none of the other passengers seem to notice the critter or are too hardened by what they had already seen traveling the city’s subway system.

The man who shot the video, Juan Guerrero, said it appeared the snake belonged to a man seen standing next to the snake.

Guerrero said the man was kissing the snake before he let him go onto the rail.

The video was eventually picked up by the popular Instagram account "subwaycreatures." The post had more than 131,000 views as of early Thursday.

Menopause-causing bait is curbing rat populations in New York

5 May 2017

Population halved in three months

By Alice Klein

It is pest control without poison. A new type of bait that stops rats from having babies is helping to tackle infestations in several US cities.

The bait – known as ContraPest – was approved by the US Environmental Protection Agency last August. It makes rats infertile by triggering early menopause in females and impairing sperm production in males. There are no side effects and the rats eventually die of natural causes.

The technique is considered more benign than other control strategies being investigated, such as gene drive, which can be used to spread infertility genes through pest populations. A recent report by the US National Academies of Sciences warned that gene drive could have unforeseen consequences.

The first field trial of ContraPest, conducted in the New York City Subway in 2013, halved the resident rat population in three months. Two more trials have now been completed in the US – one at a large-scale farm and one in an urban area – both in East Coast cities.

Rat numbers at the farm fell by one-third over three months. In the urban area, population growth was suppressed during the peak breeding season so that the population expanded at only one-third the expected rate.

“You’ll never wipe out rats completely – they’re too smart,” says Brandy Pyzyna from SenesTech, the biotechnology company in Arizona that developed the bait.
Fast breeders

“But if you think about it, one breeding pair of rats can produce 15,000 pups in a year,” she says. “Even if you can reduce that by a third in a few months, you’re already talking 5000 fewer rats, and the population will continue to go down.”

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Whale spotted in New York's East river thought to be a humpback

The New York Police Department’s special operations division posted a photo of the sighting on its Twitter account, with the message that “even the wildlife want to ring in” the new year in New York.

 

US coast guard petty officer Frank Iannazzo-Simmons told the Associated Press those in his office had not seen the whale, but said that based on the photos it appeared to be a humpback.

The whale was seen swimming along the shores of Manhattan’s Upper East Side, close to Gracie Mansion, the official residence of Mayor Bill de Blasio.

Paul Sieswerda, a retired marine biologist who leads the New York-based volunteer marine wildlife tracking group Gotham Whale, told the Guardian: “It’s uncommon for whales to be around this late in the season, and even more unusual for them to be in the harbor.

“Humpbacks would normally be heading for the warm waters of the Dominican Republic.”

This has been an exceptional year for whale sightings in the harbor and in the waters off Long Island, Sieswerda said. The first sighting in the river came in April, and a humpback whale was spotted in the East river last month. 

Another humpack took up residence in the Hudson river and was seen above the George Washington Bridge, which connects New York and New Jersey at the north-west tip of Manhattan. That whale became known as “0055” or “Gotham”.

“We followed that whale for a number of days,” said Sieswerda, 74, who was previously a curator at the New England and New York aquariums. “It was last seen in early December in the ocean. We’re quite sure that it was lunge-feeding on the menhaden.”

There is no reason to think the New Years Eve whale is disorientated, Sieswerda said, as the population of menhaden, a bait fish, has been in increasing in recent years, bringing more whales into the area.

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Thousands of dead fish cover New York canal – video

Thousands of dead fish were seen on the surface of the Shinnecock Canal in Southampton, New York, on Monday, after becoming trapped inside overnight. Tom Jones, a marine adviser at Hampton Watercraft, shot drone footage of the bizarre occurrence. It is believed the fish were chased into the canal by larger predatory fish and then became trapped inside when the canal shut early Monday morning. The fish eventually dispersed back into the bay when the canal opened later on Monday.
 

Video 

November 17, 2016

Thousands of dead fish seen in New York canal: what killed them?

by Chuck Bednar

Video of thousands of dead fish clogging the waterways at Shinnecock Canal in Hampton Bays, New York, went viral earlier this week as people wondered just what did in the aquatic creatures. Now, officials have revealed that their investigation cites suffocation as the likely culprit.

According to Gizmodo and The Verge, the videos show thousands of silver bunker fish (which are also known as menhaden fish) as they struggle for survival in the canal, each one desperately trying to take one final breath in what has been called a “gruesome fishpocalypse.”

Naturally, there was some concern that the fish were done in by exposure to industrial waste, or toxic algae, or perhaps even some yet-known phenomenon linked to climate change. Fortunately, none of those were to blame, so people living nearby have no reason to fear for their health.

So why did the fish die? As the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation told CBS News and Newsday, the fish died of suffocation after they were chased into the canal waters by a school of bluefish (their natural predators) and became trapped there. The overabundance of fish in the canal waters depleted the oxygen in the water, causing them to die off.

Officials monitoring the situation, report no additional deaths

Despite the relatively mundane cause, even locals were stunned by what they saw, according to CBS News. As Valley Stream native Dennis Demarco is said in his video of the event, “even the locals have not seen anything like this before,” adding that it was an “unbelievable scene.”

Conservation Department personnel said that they were continuing to monitor the situation, but noted that “no additional fish kills” were reported after the initial incident. “Some dead bunker are floating in the Shinnecock Bay,” Erica Ringewald, the department’s media relations director, told CBS News, “but most are believed to have sunk to the bottom.”

Read more at 

To Sell New York, the City Calls on the Ninja Turtles (Or as I call them Mutant Red-eared Sliders, or Trachemys scripta elegans pizza pizza) - via Herp Digest

By Anne Correal, 4/30/16, New York Times

If you were selecting mascots to help draw tourists to a city, the first choice might not be a group of street-fighting reptiles who live in the sewer with a rat.

That, as it happens, is just whom the officials who make such decisions in New York have chosen.

The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles — Donatello, Leonardo, Michelangelo and Raphael — will be this year’s “family ambassadors,” the city’s tourism agency announced this week. And their images will be everywhere.

“You’re going to see them in the airport,” said Fred Dixon, president and chief executive of the agency, NYC & Company. “You’re going to see them in the back of the taxi. You’re going to see them in museums. They’ll literally be your tour guides.”

The turtles, for those who may not know their origin story, first appeared in a 1984 comic book by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird, in which New York was a dirty, dangerous, crime-ridden city. They assumed human size after a canister fell down a storm drain, sliming them with a growth-inducing chemical. They took refuge in the sewers with the rat, Master Splinter, who had also been doused with the chemical. In the comic book, the turtles sneered behind masks and shouted expletives as they leapt between rooftops, swinging weapons like nunchucks and battling crime.

Asked if there had been any hesitation about employing weapon-wielding inhabitants of a grittier New York as poster children of today’s spiffier city, Mr. Dixon said no. “The turtles, like all of us, have evolved,” he said.

For his part, Mayor Bill de Blasio called the Ninja Turtles “an excellent choice” for a marketing campaign.

NYC & Company began the family ambassador effort in 2009 to help the city compete with family-oriented destinations like Orlando, Fla. Since then, with the help of characters like Dora the Explorer, the agency said, family tourism has risen 32.6 percent. Families will make up about a third of the 59.7 million tourists expected to visit this year, the agency said.

One of the tourism posters, which show the characters at well-known spots around New York. Each of the turtles is associated with a different type of attraction.

Credit

Viacom International Inc.

What’s in it for the Ninja Turtles? In a word, publicity. Just as Taylor Swift’s turn as a spokeswoman for the city in 2014 and 2015 dovetailed with the release of her album “1989,” the turtles’ role coincides with the release of “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows,” a sequel to the characters’ 2014 film. The new movie was shot in the city and is to be released in June.

Pam Kaufman, chief marketing executive and president of consumer products at Nickelodeon, which bought the rights to the Ninja Turtles franchise and proposed the idea to the city, said having them serve as family ambassadors was “a no-brainer.”

“They are New York City natives,” Ms. Kaufman said. “They are characters that love the city and know it inside and out. People recognize them.”

As for their less-than-auspicious origins, she said, “there was zero discussion around that.”

That may be another sign of how much the city has changed, or how secure it is with its cleaned-up image — though it is true that the turtles have undergone many mutations since their earliest comic book incarnation. Over time, they have been child-friendly teens who yelled only “Cowabunga!”, action figures, and, after a dark-and-brooding movie debut in 1990, goofy pals in subsequent movie and television iterations.

As part of the tourism campaign, each character is associated with a different type of New York attraction that fits his personality. Donatello, who loves science and gadgets, promotes museums and cultural attractions. Michelangelo, an optimist obsessed with pizza, is the gourmand of the group. Raphael, the rebel without a cause, touts the city’s parks and zoos. Leonardo, the leader of the pack, is a booster for the city’s monuments and institutions, places like the Statue of Liberty, the Empire State Building and the United Nations.

Asked if there would be costumed turtle characters in New York, Ms. Kaufman of Nickelodeon, said, “Thankfully, no.” They may, however, appear for photos at events outside the city.

Interviewed around Times Square this week, visitors from Australia, the Dominican Republic, Greece and the Netherlands all said they were familiar with the turtles. “The whole world knows them, adults and kids,” Jose Luciano, 22, of Santo Domingo, said in Spanish. “In the end it is a good image, because they’re helping to protect the city. And that’s how New York is, everyone is living on top of each other, wherever they can. Unless you’re rich.”

Not everyone approved of the choice. “It should be something not violent, for the kids. They should be making happy things like Sponge Bob,” said John Gunner, a hotel manager originally from Malaysia who was visiting from Australia. His 6-year-old daughter, Danica, said she would have preferred characters from “Frozen.”

The turtles may actually convey a quintessentially New York experience, said Richard Rosenbaum, author of “Raise Some Shell,” a cultural history of the characters. Their personalities, he said, reflect “a melting pot” of pop culture and New York references. In one of their films from the 1990s, Raphael had a New York accent, and the turtles would eat at Roy’s Pizza (a variation on Ray’s Pizza).

“They exemplify the experience of many New Yorkers,” said Mr. Rosenbaum, a fan since elementary school. “They’re being raised by an immigrant father, who came from Japan. They love their city, they defend their city, but they’re often not recognized.” He added: “They’re marginalized, but in fact, they’re heroes.”

And like the city itself, he said, “I think they’re seen as a lot less threatening than they use to be.”

Mr. Laird, one of the creators, said in an email, “In an era in which we have seen the development of all kinds of different — but totally legitimate — family structures, it seems quite appropriate to use the Turtles.”

“As for their being tough — yes, that is true,” he added. “But being ‘tough’ doesn’t have to mean being nasty or brutish and the Turtles certainly exemplify that.”

And, after all, the turtles are not the city’s first edgy icons. “We cashed in on ‘Sex and the City’ and now we’re doing it with this,” said Chris Heywood, a spokesman for the tourism agency. And just as fans of “Sex and the City” identified with Carrie, Samantha, Charlotte and Miranda, everyone seems to see themselves in one of the turtles. Ms. Kaufman of Nickelodeon said, “Of course, I’m Leo. Leader of the pack.”

Mr. Dixon of NYC & Company had a different choice. “Donatello, he’s the one I can relate to,” he said. “But I’m an inner Michelangelo. I have a terrible sense of humor and I like to eat.

Ghost deer haunt New York cold war bomb site under threat from developers

Group proposes turning the old depot into a world-class tourist attraction to show off both its rich military history and its unusual wildlife

Associated Press in Romulus, New York

Sunday 15 November 2015 18.42 GMTLast modified on Sunday 15 November 201520.42 GMT

Hundreds of ghostly white deer roaming among overgrown munitions bunkers at a sprawling former US army weapons depot face an uncertain future, after living and breeding largely undisturbed since the middle of last century.

The white deer with a genetic quirk that developed naturally on the 7,000-acre, fenced-in expanse have thrived, even as the depot itself has transitioned from one of the most important cold war storehouses of bombs and ammunition to a decommissioned relic.

Now, as local officials seek to put the old Seneca army depot up for bids next month, there is concern that the sale could also mean the end of the line for the unusual white deer.

A group of residents dedicated to saving the animals has proposed turning the old depot into a world-class tourist attraction to show off both its rich military history and its unusual wildlife. The Nature Conservancy also is looking at options for preserving the largely undeveloped landscape.

Read on …

Beautiful Butterfly on Brink of Revival, Despite Century of Threats

Michael Sainato | July 21, 2015 04:31pm ET

Michael Sainato is a freelancer with credits including the MiamiHerald, The Huffington Post and The Hill. Follow him on Twitter at @msainat1. Sainato contributed this article to Live Science's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.

Formed nearly 12,000 years ago by a receding glacial lake, the Albany Pine Bush Preserve in New York hosts a rare ecosystem, one of only 20 inland pine barrens in the world. Its sand dunes hold a unique variety of habitats, yet nutrient-poor soils, that support a diverse range of plants and animals that thrive in an environment too barren to support competing species. 

Karner Blue Butterflies in the Albany Pine Bush Preserve.

Credit: Albany Pine Bush Preserve Commission

This unusual landscape, surrounded by development, also holds within it an equally rare species: the endangered Karner blue butterfly, named by lepidopterist (and "Lolita" author) Vladimir Nabokov in 1944. And yet this U.S. National Natural Landmark seems always on the brink of destruction. In the face of large-scale development in the area, grassroots organizations like Save the Pine Bush have had to repeatedly rescue the park — and the blue lupine flowers that feed the local community of Karner butterflies — from annihilation. As with many endangered U.S. landscapes, threats from encroachment have been steady, dating back two centuries.

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