Mark Greene is stuck on snakes and thinks they deserve a better rep. He's
a professor of biology at the University of California at Berkeley. He not
only believes snakes have been badly affronted, but has made it his life's
work to wage war on ophidiophobia, also known as fear of snakes. It hasn't
been easy.
A collector since he was a seven-year-old in rural Texas,
Greene sees snakes as biologically and esthetically interesting. "Snakes are
natural puzzles, suggestive of things that haunt and inspire us. We ought
to consider them worthy of respect and deserving of a place in nature."
Greene says we should suspend our natural preference for animals with fur,
feathers and facial expressions. In addition to teaching students in the classroom,
he guides skeptical, and often frightened, visitors through the double-bolted
doors of the venomous-snake room at Berkeley's Museum of Vertebrate Zoology.
Greene emphasizes his theory by plucking a yard-long rattlesnake out of
its cage and telling visitors: "Touch his skin or feel his rattle. They're
really works of art!"
Besides alleviating fear, herpetologists know education is important for
other reasons. It's the first step in any preservation effort. To save endangered
reptile species and protect those that aren't endangered, herpetologists often
take their message into classrooms.
"We're hoping that the kids in those classes will look at the snakes and
learn to appreciate them, rather than be afraid of them," says Greene. "And
not that they're going to do anything today, or tomorrow, to help them, but
somewhere down the line, something will click."
Robin Andrews, a professor at Virginia Polytechnic Institute, also shares
a love of the "unlovable." As a teenager, Andrews spent much of her time wading
through the swamps outside New Orleans, catching snakes, turtles and lizards.
"There's no better feeling in the world than driving home after a long day,
covered with mud, with a pillowcase full of rat snakes beside you. You feel
like Jason after he's found the Golden Fleece."
Andrews can't understand people's fear of reptiles. "They fascinate me.
Here's an animal that's evolved virtually unchanged over thousands of years.
I look at this from a scientific point of view."
Most herpetologists had a fascination for reptiles and amphibians as children.
James Bogart, a university zoologist, says: "I was one of those kids who liked
to go out into the woods and catch animals -- and some of the easiest things
to lay your hands on are frogs and box turtles."
Not content with a simple aquarium, Bogart dug a backyard pond, lined it
with cement and fenced it in to keep his menagerie of reptiles happy. His
favorite snakes stayed in the basement until his mother discovered them. After
that, they joined the group outside.
Bogart believes that reptiles make the best house pets. "Why? I'd say because
reptiles are much more easily managed than other animals. Monkeys aren't very
good house pets. From my observations, the little children who visit our reptile
house aren't frightened by reptiles. It's when they're older that they begin
to respond negatively. I've seen many teachers shudder when they pass through.
Kids pick up on this."