Reptile Fight Club - Long vs. Focued Herp Trips

Episode Date: January 12, 2024

Justin and Rob tackle the most controversial topics in herpetoculture. The co-hosts or guests take one side of the issue and try to hold their own in a no-holds-barred contest of intellect. Who will win? You decide. Reptile Fight Club!In this episode, Justin and Rob tackle the topic of taking a long herp trip vs. a more focused herp trip.      Who will win? You decide. Reptile Fight Club!Follow Justin Julander @Australian Addiction Reptiles-http://www.australianaddiction.comFollow Rob Stone @ highplainsherpFollow MPR Network on:FB: https://www.facebook.com/MoreliaPythonRadioIG: https://www.instagram.com/mpr_network/YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtrEaKcyN8KvC3pqaiYc0RQMore ways to support the shows.Swag store: https://teespring.com/stores/mprnetworkPatreon: https://www.patreon.com/moreliapythonradio

Hi, welcome to another edition of Reptile Fight Club. It's me, your host, Justin Doolander. Happy to be here and fighting about reptile topics. And with me is Mr. Bob Rock. Rob Stone, how you doing, man? I'm great. Yeah, a couple nights in a while so we got one in the can last week and then uh last night we did the holiday show with a whole host of folks which was really fun so yeah all sorts of we're deep in it yeah so it's really good yeah two nights in a row recording so that's

uh it was fun though that the holiday show was a great time with all the guys there. And so if you haven't checked that out, take a look on YouTube. That was a live show. So you can see our radio faces and, but yeah, that was, that was a good time last night.

Poor nipper man up at 2 AM recording. He's a trooper, especially with his work schedule as of late so yeah but yeah it's uh good to see good to see everybody and it was fun because uh yeah last in within the last year i'd seen everybody on the screen in person so it was pretty cool and yeah i don't know i'm getting old or something but my memory was fading like we we were talking about the other trips we were on. I'm like, oh yeah, we did that this year. Like, holy crap.

We did a lot of, a lot of good trips this year. So that was a good time. Yeah. I was looking through it today. We had, since we had talked about it and yeah, I mean, a ton, a ton of cool stuff, ton of cool stuff coming forward. Um, and then a couple, uh, you got in a couple by yourself and all, and we did the same. And I think it kind of worked out.

We always wish the best for everyone, but it was kind of like I think we both had mild success. So there was some jealousy, some missed out, but not, uh, not like, oh man, I can't believe X, Y, or Z, you know? Yeah. I knocked it out of the park. I found everything I was looking for. So now I don't need to go back and like, oh man. Yeah.

Yeah, exactly. You know, you, you, you do hope for the best for your friends to, to find, you know, what they're looking for and things. So, you know, I was, I was really sad to hear you guys found a, a diamond back that had just gotten hit. That's a heartbreaker, especially if that's kind of the, that was probably top of the list or at least high up on the list for, for to find in Florida. So it's kind of a bummer.

It was definitely the basis for going, you know, there were other things that were certainly of interest, but there's no disputing that yeah that's what we were trying to go for and yeah um yeah so that and to see it on the first day within a couple hours and not not what we're looking for and by the same token i don't know that i'm gonna get out to the gamut ranges to look for carpets especially if your birthday thing isn't happening there so there's no no, you know, I was fully, I would have loved, you know, to see that photo because I don't, you know, there's no worry there of like, you know, I got to go to Australia

a whole host of times before that would be a priority for me. So, yeah. And it is, it was a bit of hard herping, like, and maybe it was just the timing and kind of the colder than normal, um, weather that they were having at the time. Cause I, you know, Luke did talk about his trip and finding all the gecko species we were looking for. So at least it was warmer a few weeks later, you know, so, but, uh, I don't know, it was, it's pretty remote. Um, when you get up further up into the Gammons, but you know, some of the areas of the areas down south in the Flinders were pretty accessible and not too bad.

And I really enjoyed searching in those areas. Those canyons were fantastic. So despite not finding a carpet, I really enjoyed the canyons and scenery and whatever wildlife we were able to see. So, yeah, I mean, I can see myself going back there again. It was a really cool area and lots of good potential. I need to get back there just to, you know, try to get some more of the targets that I was looking for, especially those geckos. They should be pretty easy as long as, you know?

Yeah. So what do you do? That's the reason we keep going back, I guess. Right. For sure. And that's sort of every place. And even it's sort of, even if you find them, there might be a secondary target that you didn't find, or, um, even just saying, Hey, maybe I didn't get the photos that I liked that much, you know, sort of, uh, even with the Ompeli and stuff, it's like, well, maybe we'll push our luck and try and find one that's easier to take even better photographs of and stuff like that. You know, um, the thing that jumped out to me from what you said, I, I feel like mid to end of October is really good up on the top end, but I, I think now we've been a couple of times and, uh, at that sort of timeframe. And I think probably that far South that's, you'd want to be a month or so later, you know? That's true.

And I had considered that, but I'm like, well, you know, I know people in the area. Your circumstance. Yeah. It was just a convenient way to do it. And I mean, it was a great time of year for shingleback skinks, you know, and who doesn't love to see those and so that's all i'm i still haven't seen one i'm super jealous if that's all we saw it would be still a

pretty awesome trip you know just because they're such iconic uh lizards and just fun to see but uh yeah i mean to people over there yeah yeah yeah yeah and andon. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. All that stuff. And in the Sydney area, I mean, that was more of kind of like a guided tour. You know, the locals took me out and took me to their spots. And so that was really nice to be able to see them. But at the same time,

it's, you know, it kind of takes away that satisfaction of kind of finding the areas on your own. And, you know, it's, I don't know,

I guess we're kind of similar in that attitude of it's fun to plan it out, figure it out and find it on your own rather than be told where to go or, you know, be taken and shown. I'd much rather find it. So I was happy that I spotted the first alpine, the blotch blue tongue before, you know, I spotted the first live one. We did see a DOR, but, um, yeah. And then we saw two more after that that were out in the road. So yeah, it was cool. Um, yeah, that is cool. Yeah. And, and Taliqua are fairly difficult to predict. So, you know, I guess that time of year is about your best chance to see them. So, you know, it was good time of year to see those. So, you know, I guess that time of year is about your best chance to see them. So, you know, it was a good time of year to see those.

So, you know, and I guess that's kind of the give and take, you know. One time of year might not be great for everything. It might be great for your target or, you know, something else. But, yeah, so I'm glad that they had time to take me up to the area, you know, and that I didn't have to rent a car. They were kind enough to drive me out there, but yeah, it was really cool hanging with, with Colin and, and, uh, Matt and some of the other guys that took us around. So, um, really a fun time with those guys. It was, it was a great trip.

And I wouldn't mind going back to that area. You know, it's, uh, it was, it was fun. And it was awesome. Yeah. And I mean, you're Oh, great. Great to finally find a thick tailed gecko too. That was a long time coming. I'd been in their range many times and missed out. So, yeah, that's awesome. Yeah. I was going to say the, you know, when you're speaking of timing too right the utah trip that we had last year um i think it's really difficult in especially in a wet year like that to have the success in terms of the things that are requiring that moisture to be out at

that time of year and then obviously the con color was shut down by those conditions right that level of moisture they're just not going to leave the dens and stuff. So it was sort of a, an impossible task to split both those things, at least in that weather in the weather year. And I don't think we would have done nearly as well down in the St. George area if it had been either later or not such a wet year. Yeah. Yep. I mean, some, you know, it's not necessarily a fast and firm rule. You know, sometimes you can, yeah. I remember one time I was traveling through St. George and I was, uh, I was messaging Chris and Aspen.

I'm like, Hey, I'm just passing through. If you guys want to go do a, do a couple laps with me, you know? And they're like, Oh, it's too hot. You're not going gonna see anything and i saw like four gophers a king a cow king and like um there was a a great basin rattlesnake but had been hit by a car but you know it was like there were snakes more snakes than i'd seen in a long time out there and that's on the that death stretch stretch, you know, on the 91. Yeah. Yeah.

Beaver dam slope. So, um, it was nice to see some live snakes kicking on that road. And that during the day, it was crazy just before dusk. So it was, uh, it worked out. Yeah. Great. And it might not be what you would plan. That's, you know, maybe this fits into both tonight's topic and other topics. Well, generally, they're in this space is just well, if you're there, you might as more selective and try and pick optimal times and things. You have the ability to be more selective, right? But as I think we talked about last night, either before or during the show,

is if you're planning something six months in advance, you want to try and, you know, have a plan to it and not deliberately go at a time that doesn't seem as ideal, even though it might that particular night might actually want or afternoon or whatever might wind up being the best afternoon or night. But ideally, you put in the thought to have a good plan, try and maximize them. Yeah, for sure. And I mean, that'll come to play in our discussion a little later. But yeah. How's your season going? Are you pairing many animals this year?

Nothing right now. In the, as we talked about last night a little bit, I'm changing up some like caging for the rhino rats. And so I'm super excited about that project, but that'll keep me busy until, so I won't have them paired up until sort of the normative spring warmup time, whereas you can keep them in pairs normally. And that actually works out pretty well. They are more like voids in terms of reproduction so that they they're not corn snakes where you can just have a singular male and or ball pythons and try and run that singular male through a whole host of different females um with these it seems they're more like uh boas that do best when it's

a singular pair that are kept together and for longer periods of time. Okay. And do you run multiple males or just a single pair? That's the best. For those. I, um, yeah, for the, for the most part, um, a singular male is, is fine. Uh, it's the Solomon, uh, calling back right to the earlier reptile fight club, uh, mentioned that you had, it was the Solomon Island tree boas that I've seen the multiple males really be super useful. In rhino rats, the males are bigger than the females. So it's not that same dynamic as the tree boas that have these males that are probably 15% of the volume of especially the large females.

OK. And they just don't have the energy capacity, right, to make it work. And given their natural history and observations, you know, in captivity, they clearly don't fight, and it seems like it is sort of a team effort, and maybe the functionality of being paired as a group or exposed as a group, they do it for sufficiently long that there actually is some reproductive output from all of – contribution from all of them. So it's not a deleterious strategy for a particular one to be amenable to sharing basically yeah is is it uh a resource thing or i mean because they they come from kind of a tropical setting right and i uh solomon islands are equatorial for the most part and yeah a couple of small yeah a couple of small islands um it's not even you know the the sort of large island in the Solomon Islands, what Santa Isabel is famous for the white ground boas, the white polsoni.

They're further to the southeast from there on just a handful of tiny islands. And then there's the related, a different subspecies that's on Fiji and Vanuatu that gets actually, the females get even larger than the female Solomon Island tree bows. But to your point, yeah, I think it's niche partitioning. There you go, Nipper. That in the wild, I think the males only get to the size where they eat skinks, you know, lizards. But for the most part, I do think it's actually skinks that are there. Whereas the females obviously are born at a size where that's the suitable item that's available, but they will get to a size where they're eating mammals.

And I don't know, I would guess that's mostly, or at least they're taking advantage of introduced stuff to the extent that happens. The really big ones could even eat a rat. They probably wouldn't eat for another four months, but they could take it for sure. Yeah. Okay. I mean, that's kind of what I think. So that's where they don't have male combat. the females for a resource, but also, you know, requires the males to kind of help each other out when it comes time to breed and that they don't fight each other. And the females welcome, you know, multiple males usually. So yeah, it's, uh, it's neat to see those, uh, ties across the, you know, species or, or, uh, genera or even families you know that kind of shared right across the world yeah all

these different habitats yeah right yeah and even though it's like you know the ones in australia it's usually because they come from colder habitats or you know more more temperate climates that that don't allow maybe as long a growing season or things like that so they kind of you know they're not they're spending more time focused on females, so they're not eating. So they stay smaller, you know, who knows which came first, the chicken or the egg, but you know, that's great. We're, we're looking at now. And yeah, it's just cool. I don't know. I geek out about the, the natural history of things. And I, I really, I mean, I know I kind of push this a lot on the show, but, you know, if you keep an animal, you should know what it does in the wild as best you can, you know, for as much information as is out there. And there is some good information.

You know, obviously there's some misinformation, but it's really important, I think, to learn the natural history of the things you keep. Shout out to natural history. For sure. Anything else going on cool in the reptile world in your sphere? No, I think I'm ready to fight. Well, I want to hear what you have going because you have far more, a far broader world of possibility. So I want to hear what you have going because you have far more a far broader world of possibility so i want to hear about that and then uh once we go through that stuff i'm ready

to fight all right yeah i i probably shouldn't be pairing up that much stuff because i'm you know i have way too many uh animals and so but i've paired up a few inlands and, you know, my jungle pair is stays together year round. So they may go, I've paired up the blackheads, but they usually, I don't usually have that much success. So I don't, I'm not overloaded with blackheaded pythons, but I do have two from last year that are going strong and doing well. They, they do have, you know, kind of the messed up eyes from, I pretty sure, from that temperature spike that I had early on. But the female blackhead looks like she's ovulated right now. So she's nice and swollen up, so could be looking at eggs in a couple months here. Give me another chance to try them out.

But yeah, she's doing really well. I've got some womas paired up. Can't have too many womas, it seems, she's doing really well. I've got some Womas paired up. Uh, can't have too many Womas it seems. And they're, they're looking good. I've seen a few of the pairs locked up, so hopefully that's productive. Um, pygmy pythons, you know, some of the Antaresia, I, I paired up some, um, spotted pythons, children's pythons. So we'll see what takes, but I'm not trying to overdo it. I've got way more pairs than I've put together just, uh, but I, I probably need to start, uh, thinking about further refinement and, you know, uh, pairing up some of my hold backs. Cause I've just been pairing up

some of the older pairs that I have, but I need to start pairing up the next generation. I kind of raised some up a little slower and, and I'm not in a big hurry to, to breed them, you know, that kind of thing. So, um, but I was looking at a few and I'm like, Oh, there are plenty big to breed and there are plenty old to breed as well. So, um, yeah, we'll see, see how next year goes. I need to put a little more forethought into it, but one of the big plans is get more caging, you know, get more large caging for, for some of the, the pythons, um, and increase their, their cage sizes. So, and have some more features, I don't know, like some, you know, different height areas and, you know, branches and stuff like that. So always hoping to make it better.

But I, I think for Christmas, I'm going to get a Milwaukee, uh, a Brad gun, the battery powered. So I don't have to have a compressor, uh, attached with like, you know, staple guns that I've had in the past. Yeah. The compressor on and the hose and it's kind of a pain but so i'm looking forward to trying out the the battery powered and uh that's the present my parents are giving me so at least partially so that'll be fun to play with go milwaukee i really enjoy the cordless uh cordless tools yeah so yeah 100 probably more than I should be pairing,

but we'll see what happens. I'm hoping for the agurnia to produce as well. They're, they have such small litters, you know, two or three. So it shouldn't be, shouldn't run me out of house and home.

Overwhelming. Yeah. Yeah. And it's been a couple of years, right? Since you, uh, what it was a handful of years ago that you got all of the

anteresia forms that you had produced all in the same year? Yeah. But it's been a couple of years since that happened, right? Yeah, I missed out last year on spotteds, the year before on children's, and the year before that on pygmy. So it's kind of like, yeah, I've just missed one or another. So we'll see if I hit all four this year again. We'll see if it, if I hit all four this year again, we'll see, we'll see what happens. But yeah, I finally, um, one of my, I think it's my oldest snake that I

had, uh, finally passed away. She, it was a children's Python and she was, uh, 25 years old. So, you know, she'd seen better days and had had some, uh, uh, couple rough years, but she was still hanging in there and kicking. But yeah, I lost her this year. So that was kind of a bummer. I got her directly. I bought her directly from the Barkers back in 1999 and they, that pair had hatched in 1998. So the male passed away last year and then she passed away this year. So, you know, kind of a end of an era, I guess, for, for my first children's pythons. But yeah, all

the, most of the children's pythons I work with descended from that pair. So it's kind of sad to, to lose that pair, but they, uh, they had a, yeah, Right. And I, that is a pretty good run. And the funny bit about that, right. It would be from that pair that we would have met in 2004 for me to get a pair of children's bison from you. That's right. Right. When we met up in Wyoming. Yeah. Yeah. I still remember that we were, we were on our way to my sister's, I think, and, or I think it was my sister, maybe it was South Dakota. Cause that was a while ago. Right. Yeah. Uh, well, yeah, it would be fall for fall or maybe fall out in Kansas. Because my wife and I tried to go to South Dakota, go up to Reptile Gardens and visit Terry back in the late 90s. And our car broke down in Wyoming in Casper. So we had to have somebody come bring us back home. And then we had to go back up and get the car. When they told, uh, Heidi's parents that they had a tow bar that could work with their vehicle. And then when they got there, the guy at the, the rental place is like, no, we don't have anything like that. Like, why didn't somebody tell us?

And so we had to drive back and then drive up a truck and get our car that had crapped out and take it back. So it's kind of a, a very, uh, failed mission, but, uh, eventually we got, got up to reptile gardens and got to visit with Terry and see everything. They're pretty, very, very cool spot. If you haven't made it to the reptile gardens in South Dakota, you need to give that a shot, but. Wholeheartedly agree. I've been there three times or so. And yeah, a hundred percent. Yeah. Yeah. Same for me. I've been there three

times and I'm itching to get back there. Heidi and I were just talking about that the other night too. Like when, when should we go back and put a South Dakota? It's kind of fun to go in the winter when there's no visitors. And so Terry can kind of give you a bite of detention, but yeah, he's pretty good. Even when there are visitors to kind of give us the tour and give us the show, get out all, you know, the King Cobra and play with it. And we're sitting in chairs a couple of feet away. Yeah, it's fantastic. All right. Well, we ready to put up our.

Yeah. How about you introduce that? OK, so Rob and I have have a little bit of different philosophy on her trips and planning her trips. And I tend to kind of maybe overdo it and drive, you know, thousands of miles or kilometers and in search of, uh, reptiles in different areas. So I'll spend maybe a day or two in one area and then drive, you know, four or five hours to the next spot and stay there for a night and then go to the next spot and, and do a big loop, you know, through all of Queensland or all of, Australia and, and spend maybe two or three weeks doing so. And, and then Rob tends to have more focused trips where they're set, you know, in, in the area where you might find a, a target species, you know, that he's been researching. And so he's in, you know, more limited geographical range with a more focused goal, I guess you could say.

Does that sum it up all right? So we're going to be – Yeah, I think that's fair. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that can be what we – that can be the basis of the fight. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. The grand adventure versus the focal point.

There we go. Okay. So we'll go ahead and flip the coin. You know, it's one of these things. You want to call it there? Sure. Heads. It is heads.

So I guess here's the drum roll. Do you want to take your approach and defend it or do you want to try to defend my approach? I think for this one that I will take my own approach just for the sake of hearing from you the best points as to the alternative. I do think you're the, the nature of the show, right? It does make a ton of sense to have, um, to illustrate the capacity to make the best argument for the opposite side on this particular topic. I think I want to hear sort of the best points from your perspective, um, for that, just so we can make sure that the, the advocacy can be at its best as opposed to challenging us as the advocates. Sounds good. Okay.

Then I guess as the winner of the coin toss, you get to say if you want to go first or if you'd like me to lead us out. How about you lead us out? You always start these things so well. Yeah, sounds good. You just chucked me. Um, all right. So, uh, I, I don't know, I guess, um, I think the, the, the main reason that I take these big, long trips probably stems back to my original trips in Australia. Um, where, you know,

I, I, I'm not able to get over there as, as much, obviously as much as I'd want to, but also, you know, I figure if I'm going to fly over there and spend three hours on a plane, I want to, you know, see as much as I can in that time. And so that's kind of what's maybe driven that, um, in my mind is like, oh, you know, I can find this here. Oh, wait, if I just drive a couple more hours north, I can find this. And oh, wait, look, a few more miles above that and I can find this or a few hundred more miles. I can find this. So it just kind of blossoms from from from maybe more humble beginnings and it spreads out. You know, like when I went to central

Australia, it's like, you're in Alice Springs, you got to go see Ayers Rock, you know, Uluru, you can't not go see that. And so part of it's, um, scenery as well. You know, I do want to hit some of the kind of touristy spots like, like, uh, Uluru or, um, King's Canyon, you know, Watarka, that kind of stuff. So, um, you know, if you're, if you're in the, but, and it takes a long time to get to Uluru from Alice Springs, it seemed like it took quite a, quite a drive. So, um, I, I'm, I kind of like driving too. So it's not too, uh, intimidating for me to be able to do that. And then, well, I'll save, I'll save that point for later. So I think just the fact that you can see a lot more of the, you know, the area you're in, you can make the most of your trip. And that's, I guess why I would say that I really enjoy those long road trips rather than a more focused approach.

Yeah, 100%. I think the sticking within that framework, it actually sort of the reason that I've come to like the approach that I have does go back to the first couple of trips that I took where our available timeframe, it's just inherently more limited so that I think it actually makes a lot of sense if you're talking about something, I'm going to be there for two or three weeks. That's just a wholly different deal than saying we'll be there for in-country for, I think on the first trip we were in-country across two places, a total of five nights, much to your mortification there, Jack. Yeah, three nights on a plane.

I think it was five. Wow. Yeah, I think it was five. And so obviously just the overall, you know, if you're setting the meets and bounds of the trip, the capacity to be there three times as long, yeah, it makes a ton more sense to add some variance to that. Just with all of our, meaning within the core group, right, of folks who have gone at this point not being teachers so that we have sort of a down season in the summer, right? And I know that's not always the case or whatever, but with a pretty finite, particularly Keith and Eric,

it seems like their PTO, FTO is pretty limited. So just it's almost a question of like, well, if they, I know with Keith's thing, like half to two thirds of it, he is automatically already pre-planned away, uh, meaning with family, you know, family trips and obligations and stuff like that. So, um, it's, you know, partially just the quantity question and saying, okay, what's within, within the means of practicality, right? How long could I be away for both from work and stuff at home and all that? So I think that's sort of the initial base response to saying, well, we've come from a spot of saying,

now we've been trying to add a day or two from what we started with as opposed to having started with the grand adventure. But I certainly understand it. I mean, heck, I love reading on your site. You don't do them so much anymore, but the old, very detailed trip, trip dialogues and things. And I understand why you don't because that must've been a ton of work. Yeah. It took a lot of time. And I think I was riding high on that first trip, you know,

from all the great experiences we had and all the fun stuff we saw. So, um, but yeah, I think lately it's just become a pictorial. Here's what we saw, you know? Right. Um, I, I would like to get back to the more long form narrative. And I think, uh, I, I was, I think my second trip, I wrote an article for, uh, the reptiles, not reptiles, Australia, but scales and tails, Australia, that magazine, the Kuligowski's were putting out. I think it got published in there, but I can't remember. But yeah, that was kind of the idea that that's why I started just putting up pictures because I did the long form for magazine articles.

And I was kind of thinking, oh, maybe I could do that with all my trips, but that didn't pan out. And then scales and tails folded after the Kuliginsky sold it. And it was kind of a fiasco there for a bit, but, uh, yeah, I, I, uh, I think of course that's, you know, a big factor, you know, if I didn't have the time and, and, you know, the nice thing about working for a university is, is they do have a pretty nice PTO schedule, especially if you've been there as long as I have, where I've worked for the same university since 1999. So, you know, I've got a much better accumulation of PTO. And then at the end of the year, if you don't use sick leave, and I haven't used any sick leave this past year. And so I can convert 32 hours over to PTO from my sick leave. So it just gives me an additional few days.

My dad was complaining. He's like, how are you going on so many trips? I'm retired and I don't have as many trips as you've got. So I guess, yeah, it's worked out pretty well. I guess I'm happy with my choice. I don't make much, you know, compared to like a doctor lawyer, but it works out for the PTO, I guess. Nice benefits package.

Yeah. A hundred percent. Yeah. Um, I guess another point that, that I really, I wanted to hit on, um, was when, you know, if you, if you, and, and I mean, this, this, this may kind of be off topic a little bit, but if you have that flexibility to, you know, if you're not locked down to a certain area, if you don't have, you know, rental places, if you're just kind of sleeping in a tent or something, um, you have the flexibility to kind of go where the action is,

you know, you might say, okay, well right here, you know, it's, it's too cold at night. So we're going to drive, you know, further South or, you know, depending on where you are, I guess you might be going further North if you're in Australia to get to warmer locations. And, uh, you know, I kind of learned that, uh, from, um, Jordan Parrott to some extent, he's like, you know, I kind of learned that from Jordan Parrott to some extent. He's like, you know, if you if you have more flexibility, you can maybe see more because you to plan something months in advance, but it's always, you know, you can have a B plan if, if that doesn't work and have, you know, maybe another target or another area that you want to hit if, if plan A doesn't work. And so, you know, yeah, you do need to kind of plan things months in advance and that becomes difficult and kind of logistically difficult, especially if you're traveling with people who have flown in and don't have room to bring, you know, a tent or a sleeping bag or

that kind of thing, or don't maybe don't even have that gear. And so I get it. You know, if you're planning a trip for a group, it, it tends to add, add some logistical constraints, I guess you could say, but having that flexibility to say, you know, I'm going to go try plan B because plan A isn't panning out is also a helpful tool. But so, you know, I thought I'd throw that in there. Yeah. And I think that's, you know, certainly that's fair. I think the – so there have been a couple times where we've essentially just, you know, where that has been the imperative. We just had it on the last trip to Australia, the last, quote, NPR trip or whatever, where, yeah, I changed last night, which meant I had an empty spot that I had booked and whatever. And you just sort of, well, it was 20 bucks a person or whatever.

And we just ate it and said, well, we want to move south, you know, further south sooner. And it is what it is, you know. And that's obviously not the inherent. There's a clear downside to that, right? When there is a plan as opposed to sort of what, you know, what you're describing where it's inherently nomadic with maybe the possibility to be more stationary, but I don't know. I think certainly it's a, a,

a point that I've heard before is like, okay, to what extent are you, are we soft or whatever oh you want to have a clear accessibility to a bathroom and a shower and whatever okay fair enough i'll i'm willing to take that and just say like sure i like to be able to do that when it's when it's feasible and possible right if you're in the bottom of the grand canyon there's obviously, right? And I'm not going to say, okay, well, we got to plan on doing this impossible thing to facilitate that. There's just a night or two that are out of pocket and it is when that's necessary, but when it's not necessary and we can plan something that seems to make sense months away, I'm happy to do that. And even if that means,

you know, the credibility takes a hit or whatever, cause I'm unwilling to, or less interested, not unwilling, but less interested in, um, sleeping, sitting up in a car with five other people or whatever. That that's fine. I can, my, my pride can withstand that. I don't think I could survive sleeping, sitting up in a car. Like I just don't sleep in cars. It's very difficult for me. So that would about kill me. So I'd have to have some kind of sleeping bag or tent to roll off, you know, throw on the side of the road or something, but I I'm with you there. I couldn't sleep in a car for sure. Um, I think the other thing there is, you know, if you, if you've

planned a few days in, in an area and granted, you know, what area is not going to have multiple targets, but you know, if you, if you get to an area, you just knock it out of the park on the first day and you find, you know, all of your targets and then you're sitting there going, oh, we're booked for two or three more days in the same area. You know, we just found everything and, you know, I've got other targets, other locations that I'd also like to maybe go spend some time there, but now I have to drive a few hours to get there and drive back a few hours to get back to the rental place. You know, that kind of can be a little tedious too. So, you know, without that flexibility, um, or, or if you're tied to a certain spot, you know, it does.

And, and, um, even, even if you are kind of have a central location that does require a lot more driving and a lot more tired time on the road, but, you know, you can make the best of it, but you know, that that's obviously, you know, kind of a potential downside to more driving. Yeah, for sure. Equals less herping in some instances. I mean, obviously you can road cruise, but when you're traveling on main thoroughfares, you're not going to see as much usually. Yeah, for sure. I think that's totally fair. I mean, that's exactly the instance that we just had in Australia that you're describing there, where it was like, oh, actually, you know, in this area, we knocked it out of the park with coastal carpets on that sort of eitherplanned to move further south.

But, I mean, that was exactly what you just described. And the answer was, well, I just had to eat it. But I was willing to. So maybe that's the thing. If you're going to take the approach that I do, then you need to just have the capacity and willingness to be like, I've made this plan so that there isn't the absence of a plan. I know on our first trip to Australia, the clear feedback that I had gotten was like, well, I never want to be sitting there saying, what are we going to do? I wanted to have it be, I have a laundry list of options. My recommendation or my choice would be either option A or option B, but I have through option E of what we can do, and that can include saying, hey, we're audible and completely, and I know that there's going to be a pecuniary cost associated with making this choice,

but that's fine. You only live once and you're in Australia. Like, okay, it is what it is. Or even if we're just on a domestic trip, like, okay, it is what it is. Or even if we're just on one of our, you know, a domestic trip, right. And just be saying like, okay, we've actually really seen what we want to see here. But if we go further West, then there's the capacity to add Tiger Ellis, you know, the Santa Colas, whatever it might be in a, in a better context. Heck, if we were situated in that way on Saturday mid-afternoon and we were staying in that spot through the next 24 hours from then, whatever, that's fine. I just move on. To me, that's great.

That means it went great. So I'm actually happy for it and just just like, okay, we're given, we have that much more time to try and do the other thing that I wanted to do. So I would, there's an obvious downside, right? In terms of changing plans, you know, there's some transiency to that. And there's probably, there certainly is a cost associated with doing that, but I would actually love that because it would mean that things are going awesome. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. And, and I mean, I, I've, uh, when I, you know, I've gone on plenty of trips with you and I'm, I, I will say that you are definitely willing to listen to other opinions and to, you know, re rearrange plans according to feedback from other people in the group,

you know, you're really amenable to that. And I think that's really a good quality that, you know, because I've heard of some people that just kind of say, nope, this is the plan. You're doing what I planned and shut up about it, you know, and we're doing my trip kind of thing, you know, so you're not that way at all. Right. It's really, yeah, really nice. And to the point you made, I appreciate it.

To the point you made about the central spot, again, lesson learned on, you know, our kind of as the NPR group anyway. The first trip was really that I was just thinking about this today is really I've only been kind of, from my perspective, really herping for the last five years. And it really started with our trip to the Cairns area in 2018. And, yeah, it must have been five nights because we had four nights up in Almaden, which is a southern suburb of Cannes, as sort of the base camp. And we went all the way out to Chilago, and we went up to the Daintree and, you know, down south to the famous carpet beaches and all that stuff. So that was an example of what you said. And I definitely took that as a lesson learned of saying, like,

what is the downside exactly, as you described, of a singular central place, as opposed to planning in sort of some transition and transitory nature to the whole thing. And plus, I mean, that place was fine that we stayed, but it wasn't great. And it's like, our experience would have been enriched, not hindered with some, with some momentum there with some movement that definitely would have been would have served served the trip well, you know, which is not to knock any of it or, or certainly our results. I was, you know, very happy to see a couple of scrub pythons and we saw jungle carpets and all that. So it worked out well, but they're exactly to your description of, oh, we have to either have to get moving now or just have to deal with the negative consequence of having, staying, definitively staying at this point, some places 90 minutes the other way or two hours the other way. Like I,

yeah, that's totally, totally well taken. And one other I guess, example of kind of the benefits of having that flexibility is the, you know, the cynical is that we did find we slept out, you know, just on the side of the road, um, out in the, out in the desert in, in Arizona and getting up in the morning and, you know, driving down off of that, that, uh, Canyon road or whatever we, we saw the Senacolas and we wouldn't have been in that spot, you know, if we wouldn't have slept on the side of the road kind of thing. So that was, uh, um, I guess kind of, uh, you know, if you, if you spend more time in

the habitat and less time driving, you might have a better chance of, of seeing some things now, you know, we could have easily have missed it as well, or, uh, but you know, now we know that, uh, Senacolas are moving in the morning and that's at that time of year, which kind of was surprising when we were telling people about it. They're like, oh, really? You saw one that time of year? You know, when did you see it? Oh, in the morning. Oh, that's weird. You know, usually we see him this time or whatever, you know, so it was kind of and I think too, you know, we, I guess this pertains maybe more to, um, herping in your backyard, you know, but that idea that, oh, you know, I know nothing's moving right now. I'm not going to go out or, or I've seen everything or, you know, that kind of thing.

If, uh, if you're, or no, maybe I guess not necessarily I've seen everything, but if you're, if you have a target and you say, Oh, I'm only going to look for this target in may, because that's when they're most likely to be found, you know, you might miss, uh, learning something about that species. Maybe they are very active at another time of year, but it's just kind of that doctrine that, Oh, they're only available, you know, they're only on the move in May. And so I think that's the best opportunity if it's close by to where you live that you can plenty of our targets and found pretty much, you know, what we have been looking for down there. Yeah, 100%. I mean, so, you know, this is how you win these arguments is that you bring up so many different points that I want to address that then i forget to address them um

but the uh yes so i will start at the end and then work backwards to the extent that i can remember um but yeah i'm a big i'm a huge fan of shoulder season i'm a huge fan of um sort of uh counter public opinion right contrary public opinion of saying like, oh, you can only find them at X time. For the most part, I mean, and you've seen it both where it's worked out for us and where it hasn't, of saying like, I love shoulder seasons and saying like, oh, everyone says that it has to be this, but that there's not a clear ecological indicator that would cause that limitation, then I'm dubious, right? It just says to me, it aligns with the public expectation is a self-fulfilling prophecy. So everyone goes

to West Texas at this time, and this is the time that it works, or in Arizona, this is the time. Obviously, we've proven that that isn't inherently the only time that it can happen, right? But at the same time, it's probably not totally baseless, particularly if you're talking about looking in the Chiricahuas and stuff like that. Like there's a front end or Utah or Colorado. There's a front end and a back end where it just goes, yeah, I probably wouldn't go looking in general. If I'm planning it six months in advance, I wouldn't plan to go

to colorado to her in at thanksgiving like the weather could be fine and given sort of the the native um what our climactic conditions are like generally it's actually entirely possible you might see stuff if the weather you know turns out for you and whatever that might work but that's fundamentally there are some questions to your methodology unless, heck, you had to be there for a conference on X-Day, so you were going to be there. The question to your point was, am I going to go out or not because I've presumed that you won't have success? Yes. Nothing's more self-defeating than that, for sure. Totally agree. I will say in the other – so a couple components there was in terms of the Santa Claus thing. I'm totally fine if – kind of in either instance of saying that we've pre-planned to, as I say, stay in the car.

Folks who can bring a bag have one and what circumstance dictates, but that can be fine if that's the plan and I'll just plan it in. And then alternatively, it could be, well, our plan is to go here, but let's do this thing instead because the situation is calling to us. The Santa Colas thing is particularly funny to me because our local guide, one of our local guides anyway, in that immediate area, a certain Dustin Grahn, prior to both of our non-last year Arizona ventures, I asked him about going to that spot and he dissuaded me from putting it into the plan. Okay. So that was particularly galling, uh, you know, and I understood why, because he's, I think the answer

is that he's struck out in that, you know, it's quote both the spot and a place that he spent a ton of time and it hasn't turned out. And then maybe the tide has turned a little bit on that, uh, in general, certainly it did, you know, on the day the tide has turned a little bit on that in general. Certainly it did, you know, on the day with you guys, like no doubt about that. But even when we went out there and all that, yeah, 100%, yeah. And a liar snake that tried to, you know, give me the prank of a lifetime or whatever as I'm photographing a tiger snake, a tiger rattlesnake, and I must have seen the lights or the flash or whatever.

And it said, oh, you know, I'll totally prank this dude by crawling up his back as he's taking this picture a foot and a half in front of a rattlesnake. Distracting the car. But anyway, you know, the point would be. The same lights distracted the driver. Yeah, because there's a person with a picture. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, because there's a person with a picture. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Just, you know, it would sound fake, right, if we talked about it. It's like, oh, that couldn't have happened. It did. Okay. Truth changes in fiction. But, yeah, that was kind of the funny bit to me of you guys having that success in that particular place. Oh, there's no doubt.

I was aware of that place, but, uh, yeah, you know, I took advice that now it's a waste of time. We don't want to do that. So fair enough. We'll just have to try again and whatever, but, uh, I guess, you know, yeah, if I remember, sorry, I just want to throw this in there while we're talking about that Spive. That's where I was. That's If you remember, sorry, I just want to throw this in there while we're talking about that Spive. That's where I was. That's where I spent the night when I was waiting for you guys to fly in on our first trip to Arizona.

I was sleeping on that road and I cruised it several times and found one toad. You know, it was like I could have said the same thing. This place is dead. I'm not coming back here. But since that time, we've found a Sen Colas, we've found a tiger rattler, we've seen, you know, a liar and, and all sorts of fun stuff. So, you know, it's, it, it just, well, yeah. And you've just jumped into one of my principal points, my, uh, relative to my, my strategy. Uh, thank you for that, is that that's exactly the reason that I, in general, beyond sort of the practicalities and the way I've come to this point, I like to give

spots the opportunity to express themselves differently on different nights, right? I mean, obviously, if the initial expression is everything is out, everything has gone great, then I'm, you know, it's your camp. Hey, maybe we need to be more itinerant. Maybe we should move on. Maybe we should do something different. Maybe we can mix in the grand adventure. But you could have that night.

But maybe the next night is fantastic. Like, even we've had this where the conditions can seem the same, or the night where the conditions seem optimal, we see nothing. On the next night when it seems less optimal, we've had success. I guess I just feel like those things are so nebulous and uncertain and sort of beyond my, certainly beyond my ability to plan six months in advance, right? On our most recent Florida trip, the answer was like the cold came early. And if we'd been there a week earlier, which is all of that was supposed to be like, it was supposed to be three weeks to a month before things got cool. But there was that

hurricane that came through and it seems like it basically shut down central florida like i'm three weeks early so if we'd gone the week before awesome unfortunately i didn't know about that hurricane that was going to shut down the season three weeks early uh six months in advance right um but in general like things can if we're on the grand grand adventure and that doesn't have capacity of like, okay, well, we're, yes, we have flexibility, but sort of the ideation. And when we have to be at the next place, be that a stay or you're going to meet up with a local buddy in an area or worst of all, hey, my flight, there, you know, there's an actual hard deadline to be, you know, in this other place. If you're on the Grand Adventure, you have to keep moving. And the answer could be that, like, okay, that species is just off the list, right? We thought when we, that was the first Arizona trip, right, with the Willard Eye,

is that we went to the same spot, what, three days in a row. When we were in Utah for the Gila's, we went to that spot four or five times, and it was the last one that paid out. And it was the same deal with the Willard Eye where it's like we know this is the spot. Do we – or is a very viable spot. Do we go someplace else? You know, saying to mix it up to because it that can be super dispiriting and frustrating and all that right do we go someplace else or do we you know there

we have the capacity this is the spot it just hasn't worked let's do it again yeah yeah no that's a that's a great point and i you know agree wholeheartedly that, you know, my, that, uh, one night in one place definitely tends to, to lower your chances of seeing the target. Now, if I can use that as an excuse to go back. You have more targets you could see. Yeah, sure. A hundred percent. And so, but, um, I mean, I, I think, you know, I do tend to, um, stay in an area a little longer if, if there are important targets in that area or, you know, change the plans a little bit. If, you know, we did strike out then say, Hey, let's stay here, you know, and, and, and move, you know, out of this area after we give it another night or another try, you know, and, and again, I guess the, the, that might not be feasible if you have a hard deadline, like, Oh, we have a reservation

at this place, you know, tomorrow night. And so we can't stick around here. We got to keep driving or we've got a, a in Cairns, you know, that we got to, we're, we're scheduled to do on this day, you know, so we got to make it to Cairns by that day. So you do have to kind of rearrange things. And like you said, six months in advance makes that difficult. But, you know, if, if I really want to see species X, then I spend two or three nights in that area. Oh, and I did have a thought on, you know, the same, you know, you never know what conditions are going to make a place hop

in a, in a given night, you know, you might think it's great and it turns out bus, but we went to fog dam, um, when we were in the, in the Northern territory. And that was a, that was definitely a case of we had a base camp and we were driving, you know, in, in insane distances to get back to the Airbnb. It's like, what? I mean, we went from Darwin to Kakadu and back within 24 hours to make it to our Airbnb and then spent a lot of time sleeping, you know, the next day. Yeah, that's true. Because we drove pretty much through the night and it was terrible, you know.

So that's not an advisable way to do things, you know, travel so far afield when you have a base camp in Darwin. We should have just stayed around Darwin or made arrangements in Kakadu. But, um, and, and in the, in the, in the yard in, in, of the Airbnb in Darwin, we found a Darwin carpet like the first night and found like several frilled lizards running around the, you know, it was really a cool spot, but, um, we went to fog dam, um, a couple of times on that trip and, and the condition seemed the same for both nights, but one night we saw zero water pythons. And then, and the other night we saw like seven or eight water, you know, they were, they were like, you would expect them to be all over the place in the area, you know, so saw big ones, little ones, one eyed ones, two eyed ones, you

know, they were, they were all over the place. So, um, but yeah, we couldn't figure out what the difference was between the two nights, but they knew and they were out, you know, and then same thing on the dough rat road. We, we went and saw, you know, an olive, a blackhead, several of lapids, a couple of night tigers, bunch of geckos, all sorts of stuff, a DOR frilly. That was kind of a bummer. And then we went again the next night and saw jack squat, except for maybe a couple of geckos.

And then the full moon came out and we're like, okay, this is probably why, you know, we're not seeing much. And, and then, you know, the, the other night too, it was preceded by a bit of rain. And so that was like a good omen. We found a, you know, the other night, too, it was preceded by a bit of rain. And so that was like a good omen. We found a yellow-throated monitor, breechy, you know, during the day while we were getting positioned to go herp there. So, you know, it was having more nights. And, you know, I guess that was part of that plan is we did hit those spots a couple times. And so we did see the boon and bust of the same area.

And I think when you guys went to dough rat road, it was kind of a bust. You didn't see much on, you know, and we heralded it. Yeah, definitely. We saw a really nice night tiger. Yeah. But that was it. That was basically it. And then there was a dead, you know, a kangaroo that had been hit. It was just rotting. It had probably been hit a week before and was just rotting out. So the whole thing was unpleasant. Oh, and we saw a kid, like a, got a, you know, up close to a kid down south. So it's a fun herb trip, right? Where

there's always some positive to it or whatever. But yeah, I mean, I think we had two or three nights there and all of them I would probably probably certainly based on sort of the schema that you laid out would be in the bus category. Yeah. And I mean, why is that? Who knows? Like, it's really hard to, you know, the elapids and kind of the smaller snakes and the night tigers and stuff. And then we had like a couple hours where there was nothing. And so one notable member of the party was like, let's go back to the Airbnb. It's dead. And we're like, no, we drove a long way to get here. We're staying.

We're going to hurt this place all night, you know, basically. And, you know, basically. And, you know, maybe a half hour later, hour later, that's when the Python started coming out, you know? So you do have some of those, um, nights where, yeah, you're going to spend all night herping and driving the roads and you're going to see nothing. And you're going to see, have other nights where you hit, you know, everything. And, but even on those great nights, there's still periods of, you know, slowness and you got to kind of stick to it or whatever.

And it's, it's hard to know when to call. Yeah. Yeah. We have that challenge every night basically. Right. You know, do we go or not or yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so that area that you're talking about, if we're talking about sort of door out road area, it reminds me of a point that I was thinking as a I don't honestly know whether this goes to your point or to mine, but we've hit on it a little bit beforehand, but my thought was that there are some places where there's not even, it seems like there's enough access or things to do or places to go to justify staying in that place for, say, two nights or, you know, a night and a half and two days or whatever however the the math works out and to me on our trips the the two times this has come up where west texas is sort of this way just because there's so little publicly accessible land and at least in theory you can't road cruise that like it's you have to drive these huge expanses it It's sort of this massive area, even without that much access, right? It's the antithesis of Utah, right, where there's so much accessibility. And even Florida.

I was shocked and pleasantly surprised by Florida in terms of all the publicly accessible opportunity within Habitat. The other spot was, yeah, around Captain Creek, uh, Captain Creek and all that on the last Australia trip that we had taken. Um, it was sort of the same thing where it was like, okay, this is, it's a surprisingly, and maybe it's something to do with, this is a big picture question of like, okay, certain ecological niches are larger or smaller. And just that particular one that has coastal carpets, which are very cool, but, you know, that sort of becomes the big ticket item in that area. It's a shockingly large area, at least for Australia, with the same animals. It's relatively diverse around that area for a broader or a further way than

you would think, or sort of what we're used to. And certainly there, when you're into areas that have some elevation, maybe it's because there isn't much elevation change around there. And so that gives it a much wider scope where all the things are more or less the same. So you actually have to go further to start seeing different things. Whereas both Utah, Colorado, a lot of the trips that we've taken, there's so much elevation change that we see more speciation within a narrower diameter circle, right, in terms of mile radius. Yeah, that's a good point on that.

So I don't really know how that fits in, but, you know, maybe that speaks to whether timing within an area, right, is saying, like, if it's all the same stuff and the habitat is the same, maybe you should inherently plan for less time in that area because you're going to spend longer in it just by the nature of having to get through it as opposed to saying this is an area where if I drive 10, let alone 50 miles down the road, all the species are different. The habitat is completely different. There's so much more opportunity. That's probably a better base camp opportunity. Whereas if it's all the same critters and habitat for 200 miles, we probably, that speaks to your strategy. Yeah. Or I guess the alternative to that is you

broaden your target list. You know, you include maybe a weird, you know, leaf-tailed gecko that's only found on a mountain range close to that area or a bird or, you know, leaf-tailed gecko that's only found on a mountain range close to that area or a bird or, you know, sorry to say the B word, but maybe a bird or some kind of... I heard it. Yeah. Some other kind of mammal or maybe even like a hike or, you know, a geological feature or something.

So even if you're finding the same things over and over, you might find something unique and, you know, you know, pretty close by or in that area, especially if you're sticking to the same area for three or, you know, three or two or three nights, you'll want to have kind of those backup plans in case you do find everything and you don't have the option of driving far away. So, you know, broaden your horizons. I guess that was kind of the, the, uh, take home when we were on the door at road. Cause I kept stopping for geckos and the guys were kind of whining about it. Like, what are you stopping for another gecko? I'm like, are you kidding me? You just want to drive? You

don't want to stop and look at this stuff. Like, come on. And maybe that made us miss a children's python crossing the road or something, but you know, I think you got to kind of look at the bird in the hand rather than the two in the bush, but yeah. Yep. No, I totally agree on that. And I think that's, yeah, it is super important just in general, field herping generally, to embrace and maximize the opportunity with all the different things that you can because, yeah. Oh, I know you had mentioned this, right, when we, one of those, talk about a rare bird, the student of the serpent episode that we've done on WomblePythons where Eric and I chatted with you about your experience with that. And the pull to move forward because, hey, I just found like early in the night, right? I found this awesome thing that must be a positive harbinger, right?

You know, and instead that wound up being the only thing. And you retroactive only with the benefit of hindsight. Can you say, well, I should have just spent three hours with that thing. Yeah, yeah, right. Yeah, it's always that question of should I move on and try to find more or should I be happy with what I have? Yeah, that's a tricky call to make. 100%. Yeah. 100 percent. One thing. Another point that I think is an advantage of the localized trips are not trying to cover too much ground. And again, this so this needs to be the right environment for this to happen. So this makes sense in Utah, makes sense in Florida, doesn't necessarily make sense in West Texas, is that if you're focused on an area, I feel like you can do both things. You mentioned, right, essentially if you go to Darwin, you have to go to Fog Dam.

It's obligatory. If you went on a herp trip and you flew into Darwin and you didn't go to Fog Dam, people would say, what the heck are you doing? That doesn't make any sense. So there's obligatory spots. And then, so if you're transitory through that area, then if you're going to sort of follow that logic and do the obligated spot, then you don't really have time to go off the beaten track, try and find, oh, actually, the folks who live in Darwin, yes, they're fogged in, blah, blah, blah.

But the spot they won't tell you about is X, Y, or Z, right? That's two miles away, and they prefer that nobody go there and all this sort of stuff. If you're on a focus trip, to me, you have a greater capacity to do both those things. You can go to Uluru. You can do the obligatory tourist thing. Seriously, you went to the Red Center and you didn't go to Uluru? What's wrong with you? Blah, blah, blah. What is detention?

It's not like a hop, skip, and a jump. So, like, you got to – there's a commitment to that. And if you only have a short period of time there, the only thing that happens is, oh, I – especially now that you can't, you know, get onto Uluru, that it's like, oh, you stood X distance away, you took some photos, and hopefully, I mean, shoot, we do see, I forget whose photos it was, but actually it was the Reptile Mountain, a local guy to me, had a video where on the road, he saw a moloch on the road do larue and all this stuff it's like awesome um the you know that that's fantastic but say it's not there for you on that

day or whatever and then you it's just to me if you're in a folk in a uh focused area you have a great capacity to do quote what you need to do and also explore some things that aren't what people would tell you to go do. Um, you know, so to me, that's, that's sort of an advantage is that you have the opportunity to do those things as opposed to saying, Oh yeah, I went to the red center and I didn't go to Uluru or saying, yeah, I only went there and I didn't actually get sort of, you know,

into a creek bed in the McDonald's or whatever. Yeah. And, I mean, we went out there, my dad and I, when we went to central Australia and I was kind of shocked by the ticket price to get into Uluru. It was like a hundred bucks a person or, you know, an extravagant amount in my, my opinion, you know, it seemed like, Whoa, I'm used to, you know, American, uh, national parks, but maybe it wasn't that much, but it was like a lot for me at the time back in 2010, when I was kind of just starting out as a professor.

And so the, and then you were expected to leave the park. So, you know, we got there, we actually slept out along the way. And so we were, we got to Uluru or the park in the morning. And then I was shocked by the, the lack of trails within that place. So you're spending a hundred bucks and there's a total of like four trails to go on. It's like, and then they expect you to get out of there within your 24 hours or whatever, and maybe pay and come back in for, if you want to go another day, we actually, we actually just kind of broke the rules and slept in the parking lot at a cat of Judah, the, the Olga's. And, uh, um, I guess we're lucky

we didn't get booted, but kicked out of there, but we've, yeah, set up our tent in the parking lot and it was raining. So maybe that's why the Rangers weren't out checking because they figured nobody would be that crazy. But, um, so we got up early in the morning and did the hikes around Kata Judah the next day. So, uh, we kinda, you know, the system a little bit or however, whatever the saying goes, but, um, so, but you know, we, we got to see a little bit more and, you know, stay out there a little longer, but man, it was,

it was cool around that area and you know, it's, there's some benefits of there and, and we only saw them DOR, but you can see a Centralian and Blue Tongues in the same area there. Womas, you know, all sorts of good stuff out in, you know, by Eulara out in that area. So it's a cool spot to hit. And I just felt like we had to do it, you know. And I don't know that we would have done it if our rental hadn't have had unlimited miles. Because the rental place is like, no, you don't have unlimited miles.

You have 100 Ks a day. And I'm like, holy crap, we can't use up all our Ks to go back. Yeah, it doesn't work. And it just doesn't work. So luckily, I showed them the rental agreement that said unlimited miles. And so they let us do it. And we put a lot of miles in that car. But yeah.

But we were kind of in the same area for many days. Once we got back to Alice Springs, we had four or five nights in Alice and the surrounding area, you know, the, um, mountain range there, McDonald ranges and kind of made our way to different canyons and stuff, but still missed out on a lot of cool stuff, but always a reason to go back. I guess we did see some good stuff for while we were there, but I need to get back there. Yeah. The Gillens. Oh, right away.

The Acronthus. Yeah. Uh-huh. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, there's there's definitely pluses and minuses. And, you know, I think that's been nice to herp with you to kind of see the benefits of of your method of of trip planning and also kind of see some of the things that I like about my method of herp trip planning. But I think as far as group settings go, yours takes the cake because, you know, I guess it is fun to sit around like a campfire out in the wilderness, you know, in a tent or something and just kind of end up where you end up looking at the stars. Or it is nice to have a little shelter and you

know like especially in the case of inclement weather like the rains when we're sitting watching you know uh napoleon dynamite with nipper because we got rained out you know and we had a place to stay that night so that is a nice nice benefit of that. Yeah. And the only thing that I didn't say that I had intended to or thought as a point, and I don't even know that it goes to one side or the other more so than just speaking to the process. And maybe folks who are listening can adapt it into their own process. And really, I think it's an amalgamation of both ours. It's saying that in general, I plan wide, plan wide lens and have sort of a big picture vision that's more in line with a trip that you would take. And then perpetually, as I evaluate and evaluate and make choices, that lens shrinks. And that's, I think, important and really shows the value of sort of the approach that you have is saying, okay, if I'm going to this area generally,

what's the broadest possible realistic universe of things I could find? Then let me kind of sort through that both in terms of practicalities and priorities, and then work, you know, work down to, okay, how would that actually fit in into a realistic plan, and go for it. And that might be the grand tour, and that's the best answer, or it could be, actually, we could base out of here, and that is literally centrally located, gives us all the things that we want, is centrally located, all this different stuff, gives us access to a whole bunch of different things not the downside of saying okay well i'm overly stuck in a habitat that isn't is all the same and so to your point of the ability to move on it's not only weather conditions it's like well i'm just sort of done with this be that done through success or done through failure

sometimes you know the ability to to just move on is really important. Yeah. I think that's a nice summation of the discussion for sure. You know, there's definitely pros and cons to every side and, you know, I might get stuck out in a snowstorm or something and have to drive a long way to avoid that or, you know, that kind of thing. So, but you know, I, I, uh, it is good to think about and kind of pick your strategy or, and, and I think, you know, our discussion has brought up a lot of good, uh, salient points. And, um, you know, when you choose, when you get out there and go, go on a trip or plan a trip, you can kind of see what you like to do. And, and hopefully our discussion will help you in that, that process.

But I think the, the bottom line is do your research, know, you know, what's in the area. Don't go to some Island that, you know, is the type locality for a really cool species and not know it, you know, and, uh, and, you know, it's, I, I would recommend broadening your horizons and, and, you know, appreciating the other things. Cause that's another, you know, part of it is if you're not hitting on your target, um, if you have a lot of, you know, different targets, you're going to be happy for the most part, you know, if you miss out on a couple of key ones. And I think that, uh, definitely happened with South Australia. You know, I could take comfort in seeing 40 shinglebacks, even though I didn't see a carpet and some cool knob tail geckos, but, um, that's the way it goes sometimes. And, and, you know,

you just roll with it and, and appreciate it as much as you can. Be it the company you're with or the, the other animals you get to see, or the, just the beauty of being outside and being in nature. It all works out to your benefit, I think. So just get out and herp and get out and experience the natural world. I think that would be the bottom line and something we can definitely both agree on wholeheartedly. It's better to be out and missing on your big targets than not being out at all. And either way, you're going to learn something either through the weather conditions or the things the, you know, the things that the, your target are experiencing, even if you don't get to see them, you can say, okay, well, maybe they don't need to be out in this kind of weather or this kind of, uh, circumstance. And you can still learn a lot of things, even if you don't see your targets. Anything else to add there? Stat sig. Yeah, stat sig.

All right. Well, yeah, that was a good topic. I like talking about that. And I think my upbringing probably shapes that a lot. When I was young, my dad gave me the option, do you want to go hunting during hunting season or do you want to go backpacking? And I chose backpacking. So I'm, you know, got used to carrying my supplies on my back and, and my home and bed on my back. And so, you know, that, that's not very foreign to me.

And so I, I, uh, have all the supplies and all the, you know, equipment and things. And so it's kind of second nature in a lot of ways. And just like running around on the rocks and climbing cliffs and things like that, it just, you know, that's what that's how I grew up. So it's kind of second nature to me. So may seem strange and bizarre for somebody looking from the outside in. But to me, that's just the way it goes. So, um, but yeah, I, I think, uh, regardless of your, your upbringing or how comfortably you are, there still is a lot to be a lot of rewarding things to be found out and out

in nature. I don't know what, what trip are you looking forward to most in the coming year? Oh, I think that's gosh, an impossible question, right? At this point, six on the, you know, six that I know of with the seventh hopeful and whatever. So there's something about each of them that I'm super excited about, but yeah, just, uh, getting to it, you know, and getting back out there and doing it and, um, all of it. Right. As you said, it's both, uh, the environment,

just being in the space, not only being in the space, but it's sort of your own space or your own headspace associated with doing it, saying, sort of carving away that time to be in what hopefully should be a really good sort of space of clarity and enjoyment. And that's why it is so important to be, as you said, to be able to appreciate, even if it's just context of the thing of saying like, hey, I'm not doing, I'm out of my normal routine. And that has great value in itself. Yeah, sure. Well, yeah, I guess this is kind of a painful topic to bring up in the middle of winter, but who knows when you'll be listening to this.

Maybe it's right in time to plan a great herp trip in the spring, but, um, yeah, I, I'm just excited to get back out there. It's, uh, it, the winters seem uncomfortably long sometimes, but I guess that's what Australia is for. Go to, go to Australia during the winters in the Northern hemisphere or something, or somewhere else down the southern hemisphere when it's cold here uh well yeah great uh great discussion thanks man um anything cool in in the logical realm that you've seen in the last uh week or two yeah i just became aware today that and presumably it means that I missed it, or maybe it's because we've had so few, we don't have our weekly, you know, necessarily stuck to the schedule, weekly NPR updates or whatever.

Maybe you knew, and I didn't talk to him about it at Carpet Fest, but I didn't realize that Ryan had bred Lesser Sundance Pythons this year, which are a snake that I love to hate. Yeah, I just thought, I was like, and maybe I knew that, but hadn't fully appreciated it or whatever, but as an animal, that I think I've had them, and I know, if I'm recalling it correctly, when Ryan and I talked about this four or five years ago, he was sort of similarly situated, although now he's had great success. That's something I've had them four or five different times

because they're so beautiful. They feel so soft. They're trying to run through it to make sure I'm not misstating it. They're my favorite Indonesian python for sure. They're similar to reticulated pythons in some ways, but they're very much their own thing. They're actually sort of like an Indonesian Jamaican boa in some ways. And I know that Ryan is very jealous of the sort of the images that's in the book, Advances in Herpiculture, where Dave and Tracy, when they first brought him, I know he's jealous of it because he took the same picture of one popping out of the egg, just

gorgeous. So somehow I admit that, because that's a huge deal. Those animals are very touchy. They don't, on the last time that I've had them before I sent them to Owen, they just didn't acclimate it. They did fine in 28 quart tubs. And they were at a size where you'd say, wow, that's what you keep it in. And the answer was that they did really well in there. I tried to move them into cages and they went off food. They hid for literally five weeks, even at night, with a red bulb coming in. They hid away. They're almost unmatched in their capacity to not want to, both disturbance of routine and then

unwillingness to show themselves, you know, consistent fear and that sort of thing. So, um, that's super impressive and I'm really glad for him. So yeah, today I either learned about for the first time or took in and actualized for the first time that. So, yeah, that's a hell of a thing. That's funny, too, because I realized it today as well. I was I was scrolling through Facebook and maybe I just haven't been on Facebook that often, but I saw it there. Yeah, me too. Oh, wow. Cool.

Congratulations. Yeah, that's pretty neat. Yeah. How about you? I haven't really i've been focused on a couple projects i'm working on now so i haven't been kind of going outside of that realm but i'm learning a lot about uh uh local local stuff lately and so that's been exciting it's getting me really pumped up for this uh coming spring when things warm up and i can go flip some rocks or something and look for some of these species that I haven't seen. I'm not sure if I saw a smooth green snake in Utah or not.

I seem to have a memory of being young and seeing one in a tree, a smooth green, but it could have been a yellow-bellied racer, you know, which are more commonly encountered. But I remember being in the mountains with my dad on a trip and seeing a green snake, you know, in the trees that I, that got away from me and I lost it, but I remember seeing it. But, you know, that could have been a dream. I could be having some weird mis-memory or false memory. So that's what I want to find in the spring. I want to go see if I can try my luck in, in the mountain ranges. And there's some areas that look like they have higher number of records on

INAT or whatever. So I'll go check out those areas, but I'm kind of excited for some of the locals. And I, I like, I was going to mention this in our discussion, but, uh, I think, you know, when I was starting out and I had less PTO, I was focusing more on saving up my time so I could go to Australia for three weeks. And I was neglecting my backyard, you know, I wasn't herping as much in Utah and, and especially where, where I live. And so these last few years of kind of more, um, us-based herping trips and things like that, it's made me appreciate the stuff that we have in the state and, and also kind of, um, a little

embarrassment on my own part of not having found, you know, especially after meeting Nipper and, you know, hearing he's, he's a couple species away. Yeah, exactly. How do you not know, or how do you, how have you not found everything in your state yet when he's found everything pretty much in Europe? So yeah, he's, he's, uh, inspired me to get out and find all my local things. And I mean, that, that makes it hurt all the more when you guys find a pair of pyros when I haven't made it on the trip yet. So I need to rectify. Well, we only found them because of that circumstance.

Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of one of those quirks. Yeah. But I, I, I did appreciate the message that I got or the call that I got from you guys saying, hey, guess what? I'm glad we had service there. That was pretty good. Because you did call it.

You called it. So I can't complain because I made the choice to come a day late. So that's my own fault. And maybe that's the reason you guys found it, right? If I wasn't there, we wouldn't have found it. I think that's the way to take it it right if i wasn't right i think that's the way to take it yeah we wouldn't have found it but it would have been there it's not that you being there or whatever we would have been there 10 minutes earlier 10 minutes later because you know right whatever you know yeah yeah and and i think um and and that's okay i mean

i guess i'm i'm glad that it wasn't like i had to fly into Australia a day late and I miss seeing the Owen Pelly python by a day. You know, that would be a little harder to rectify. But these are in the backyard. I can drive three hours and go find one, you know. So it's not the worst thing in the world. So, yeah, someday I'll get there. 100%. thing in the world. So, yeah, someday I'll get there. A hundred percent. Well, to your point, I will give your approach or at least a variant of your approach.

One final point here would be the night we saw the Olimpeli python, the black-headed python, one of two northern brown snakes, all that stuff. That happened in the vein of a trip more of your making, in that we were not intended to be there. Eric had left his phone. A German had returned it to the crocodile-shaped hotel.

So we were there anyway. We were going to try and go in the morning, and I said, let's give it one more go. Let's give it three nights, which seems to be the magic number up in that spot. And, uh, you know, sure enough, it came off, but it wasn't to plan. We do your point. We did, I think we drove nine or 10 hours that day based on sort of the route that we had going and getting back out there and all that stuff. And yeah, you gotta be adaptable. And that made a huge difference. Paid off.

Yeah, paid off. That's for sure. Well, my friend, it's been a good discussion. And we've put in about an hour and a half now. Not a record breaker, but it's a pretty long episode for Uptown Fight Club. So we had plenty to talk about and I think we both feel passionate and, and our, uh, you know,

can see the benefit of either side. So that was a great discussion and appreciate it. And your, your preparation and the good points you brought up. So, all right, well, um,

there's nothing else to, to touch on. I guess we'll, uh, say good night and thanks again for listening to reptile fight, I guess we'll say goodnight. And thanks again for listening to Reptile Fight Club. And we'll catch you again next time. Fight Club. Thank you. Outro Music Bye.