Amid sandy floor coated by noticed palmetto and the occasional prickly pear cactus, Shiv Shukla appears to be like for snakes.
He has been doing this recreationally since he was a child, however now he slogs by means of the woods with urgency.
Shukla is worried about many threats going through snakes. During the almost 3-mile trek throughout the University of South Florida Forest Preserve in the hunt for one, he speaks at size about invasive species, habitat destruction and urbanization.
But his grasp’s thesis focuses on an understudied and rising peril — Ophidiomyces ophiodiicola, a pathogen delivered to Florida from Asia within the pet commerce, which causes a deadly fungal illness within the reptiles.
“When people think of invasive species, they think of the pythons, the iguanas — things like that,” Shukla mentioned. “But the pathogens, too, can cause detrimental impacts, which is what we’re trying to study.”
Similar fungi have brought on extinction for some frogs and salamanders, however snakes have largely sidestepped widespread fungal annihilation.
Shukla says that will quickly change.
“We’ve seen what imported pathogens and non-native pathogens can do to the populations of other animals,” he mentioned. “It’s concerning when you see a new pathogen emerging in a population that you study.”
Shiv Shukla, a graduate scholar in conservation biology on the University of South Florida, appears to be like for snakes on the USF Forest Preserve.
[ JENNIFER GLENFIELD | Times ]
Whether in snakes, different animals or people, illnesses unfold quicker in densely populated areas than they’d usually out within the wild.
“Florida is rapidly urbanizing and being developed,” Shukla mentioned. “They’re going to be all kind of packed together in small green spaces.”
Even close to his New Tampa neighborhood, Shukla has seen a lack of greenery as extra folks transfer into areas the place wildlife used to roam.
15 years in the past, undeveloped thickets stretched throughout north Tampa. Shukla has watched outlet malls change the woods the place he used to catch snakes.
Around the age of seven, he saved a innocent backyard snake that was trapped inside his mother and father’ pool enclosure. Not solely was it his first time dealing with a snake, nevertheless it was the primary time he noticed the consequences of human sprawl on nature.
“If there’s a forest you might not see them,” he mentioned. “But if there’s no forest, then they’re going to end up coming to your swimming pools.”
Shukla, 23, mentioned his mother and father are supportive of his work, however have a ban on snakes in the home. Instead, he cares for 2 poison dart frogs, two tree frogs and a bearded dragon at home.
Reptiles had been his old flame. In kindergarten, Shukla’s academics posted notes that advised guests what the children needed to be after they grew up. Careers like “astronaut” and “doctor” littered the show.
Next to Shukla’s title? “Herpetologist.”
Shiv Shukla, 23, and Jessalyn Aretz, 27, are graduate college students in conservation biology on the University of South Florida.
[ JENNIFER GLENFIELD | Times ]
His snake analysis has taken him far already — he has traveled to Louisiana, Yellowstone and the Smoky Mountains. But Shukla has desires to journey to Africa to check the inexperienced mamba, considered one of his favourite unique snakes.
Shukla typically lends his experience on his neighborhood’s NextDoor discussion board and Tampa Facebook teams. Under posts of snakes are feedback like “Shiv would know,” or “Shiv Shukla — would you mind identifying this snake, please?”
Shukla says it’s a each day stream of snake-related questions. One neighbor urged he ought to begin a web site known as “Go Ask Shiv.”
“I tell people, you know, I’ve worked with (poisonous snakes) every single day,” he mentioned. “And I still haven’t gotten bitten, so you don’t have to fear them as long as you give them safe distance and you’ll be OK.”
He enjoys his native fame when he’s educating folks about conservation or relocating a snake in misery, however he has a lukewarm feeling towards the “snake man” title he’s earned on-line.
“It’s fine,” Shukla mentioned, smiling and searching down at his sneakers, now soaked from wading knee-deep throughout a pond. “I understand the appeal.”
He walked over to a different “cover board,” a skinny piece of plywood that gives shelter for snakes. After lifting it up with a steel hook and digging round within the earth, he discovered nothing beneath.
Shukla shrugged and stored walking by means of the protect.
On this explicit August day, Shukla mentioned the 95-degree warmth has stored the snakes in hiding. This is typical throughout hotter months — he mentioned he may catch simply 30 snakes in the summertime and upwards of 200 within the winter.
“When it’s this hot outside and the sun is kind of beating down on everything, the snakes aren’t as surface active,” Shukla mentioned. “It’s a lot harder to find them.”
But this summer season — partly as a result of drought circumstances and excessive warmth — he’s seen even fewer snakes.
If he catches a snake exhibiting signs of the illness — pores and skin lesions and ulcers — Shukla brings it again to the lab to check for the fungus.
Snakes affected by Ophidiomyces ophiodiicola, a lethal fungal illness exhibit signs like pores and skin lesions, ulcers and erratic habits. They typically dry themselves out within the solar to rid themselves of the fungus.
[ Courtesy of Shiv Shukla ]
There are a couple of dozen snakes sheltered at his USF St. Pete analysis lab. Shukla feeds them each week and named most of them himself: There’s Snape the venomous cottonmouth and Rex the innocent rattlesnake.
Snake handlers want 1,000 documented hours working with venomous snakes earlier than the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission grants them a allow — greater than some airplane pilot certificates.
“No matter how long you’ve had this thing, or how well you know their personality, they can always turn on you,” Shukla mentioned.
Jessalyn Aretz, 27, typically goes out with Shukla within the area. They met final 12 months when Shukla joined the graduate program. A 3rd-year conservation biology masters scholar, Aretz focuses on invasive cane toads and their menace to native wildlife.
“I’ve learned a lot about snakes just from meeting him,” she mentioned.
Jessalyn Aretz, a 3rd 12 months grasp’s scholar at USF learning conservation biology holds a tadpole fished from a pond within the USF Forest Preserve.
[ JENNIFER GLENFIELD | Times ]
While Shukla is digging below concrete rubble for snakes, Aretz is scooping tadpoles out of standing water with a internet.
Shukla simply completed the primary 12 months of his masters and has yet another to go earlier than wrapping up his snake illness analysis. He expects his completed thesis will uncover extra questions than solutions.
“I don’t think I’ll be satisfied,” he mentioned.
But Shukla isn’t prepared to go away Florida, which he says is at a “crossroads” and wishes biologists and conservationists greater than ever.
“I think it’s really important that we study these creatures and these habitats right now while we still have Florida,“ he said. “The green mambas can wait.”
