Hello, Frank Indiviglio here.
The process of hibernation (or brumation) in reptiles and amphibians seems subject to a great many factors.  For example, I have noticed that spotted and Eastern box turtles, and other temperate North American species, vary greatly in this regard.  In captivity, wild-caught individuals usually slow down (activity and feeding) during the winter, [...]

The house cricket is something of an insect oddity…at once both an adaptable, widely introduced species and a somewhat delicate captive.  Native to southwestern Asia, it fares poorly in the damp conditions favored by field crickets and other North American species. 
Providing a Water Source: the advantages of gels
House crickets will not survive long in damp [...]

Hello Frank Indiviglio here.Please see Parts I and 2 of this article for information on housing and diet. Today I’ll conclude with some thoughts on toads in community terrariums and the wild.
Tank mates
American toads are quite peaceful towards one another, but larger animals will nudge others from food, so keep an eye on them at feeding [...]

Hello, Frank Indiviglio here.
The 60+ species of sea snakes – brightly colored, highly venomous relatives of the cobras, mambas and coral snakes – are little studied and not often seen in zoos.  I was fortunate enough to have worked with yellow-bellied sea snakes (Pelamis platurus) at the Bronx Zoo, but the species is no longer [...]

Hi, Frank Indiviglio here.Last time I reported on the Staten Islands Zoo’s use of the Zoo Med 10.0 High Output UVB Lamp (Please see Part I of this article). Today I’d like to provide some specifics concerning tests carried out there.
Test Results
The UVB output readings recorded at the Staten Island Zoo are as follows (note: [...]

Click: My Animal Collection: How a Herpetologist Keeps American Toads, Bufo (Anaxyrus) americanus and Related Species, Part I, to read the first part of this article.
Temperature
American toads are, in contrast to many amphibians, quite resilient in terms of temperature tolerance.   However, they do best at moderate temperatures, and in the heat of summer will attempt [...]

Hi, Frank Indiviglio here. 
Today’s article is the second in a series concerning animals in my own collection.  For additional information concerning this line of articles, please see My Animal Collection: How a Herpetologist Keeps Barking Treefrogs (Hyla gratiosa) and Gray Treefrogs (Hyla versicolor).
Note: the following information is also largely applicable to other toads that commonly [...]

Hello, Frank Indiviglio here.
Today I’ll introduce a member of a group of insects that have long fascinated me – the stick insects, or walking sticks. Several of the over 2,700 described species are well established in captivity, especially among European hobbyists. They are growing in popularity here in the USA also, most commonly, [...]

Hello, Frank Indiviglio here.
In 1969, Carl Kauffeld introduced a generation of budding herpetologists to snake-keeping with his wonderful classic Snakes: The Keeper and the Kept. In it he laid out the basic principals that had yielded him decades of success while curator of the well-known reptile collection at New York City’s Staten Island Zoo – [...]

Hello, Frank Indiviglio here.The bizarre Surinam toad needs little introduction to amphibian enthusiasts…their unique strategy of brooding the eggs below the skin of the female’s back has rendered the species quite well-known. Yet, when I received a group of adults in 1986, I found that little had been published on their husbandry, and the last [...]