• Responding to email notices you receive.
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    In short, DON'T! Email notices are to ONLY alert you of a reply to your private message or your ad on this site. Replying to the email just wastes your time as it goes NOWHERE, and probably pisses off the person you thought you replied to when they think you just ignored them. So instead of complaining to me about your messages not being replied to from this site via email, please READ that email notice that plainly states what you need to do in order to reply to who you are trying to converse with.

  • IMPORTANT! PLEASE READ!! About the Google Adsense ads being displayed

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    Posted 08/15/2025
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    Yeah, I know. They are a pain in the butt. But they pay the bills to keep my server running. Just a fact of life, I am afraid.

    Want to get rid of them? Simple. Just become a Contributor level member or above and they will be gone. -> Please click HERE."

    Is that too much for me to ask of you to keep this site running? Well, sorry about that. I too wish I could get everything for free. But alas.....

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    Addendum: 01/10/2026
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    Google Adsense ad revenue for December, 2025 was just $30 over the cost of the lease for the server running this site. So, in effect, the money providing the incentive for me to continue running this site is coming SOLELY from the paid memberships and sponsorships here. Which honestly ain't much....

Herping spots in the NJ pine barrens?

Batsto Village in the southern corner of Wharton is great for fence lizards. Theres a wooden fence along the road on the western side of the village, always see them there. I also like Brendan T. Byrne State Forest. There's all kind of stuff in the Pakim Pond area, like fence lizards, skinks, frogs, ect. Depending on how far south your thinking of going, Lizard Tail-Swamp Preserve is neat although your almost down by the cape may peninsula. I always see eastern toads, fence lizards, 5-line skinks, and at least one Box Turtle.
 
When I used to live in Maryland, I loved going up to the New Jersey Pine Barrens and spending a day looking for stuff. I commonly found coastal plains milk snakes and northern pine snakes, and the occasional corns, and eastern kings. I used to have maps with spots marked out, but that was something like 25 to 30 years ago now. Even if haven't thrown those maps out, I'm not even sure the spots even exist any longer.

I would actually love to go back there for nothing more than to look at the insectivorous plants in the bogs. Used to be areas that were the ground was just covered with the thread sundews.

It's definitely an interesting place. But make sure you have your GPS with you. It's very easy to get turned around on those nameless roads that snake off in every direction. And 4 wheel drive is pretty handy to have too. Some of those sandy roads during dry seasons can be pretty challenging without it. And during the wetter seasons, you will have a fair number of water crossings you will have to deal with.

Ah, them's was the days....
 
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