Steve's Herpetological Blog

An insight into the life of Steve, his research and the many books he reads

Steven Allain

#SciFri: A herpetologist visits the Aquarium de Paris

During my visit to Paris this summer, one of the places I was able to visit (apart from the millions of museums and galleries) was the Aquarium de Paris, which is situated in the Jardins du Trocadéro overlooking the Eiffel…

#MuseumMonday: Hastings Museum and Art Gallery

If you love museums that feel like friendly encyclopaedias of a place where local history, natural history, art and a surprisingly global collection rub shoulders in a handsome old building, then the Hastings Museum & Art Gallery is a quietly…

#MuseumMonday: Braintree District Museum

Despite the fact my mum lived in Braintree for over a decade, I never actually visited the local museum. At the time I wasn’t the biggest fan of local museums and was unaware of their significance. So, I decided to…

#MuseumMonday: Galerie de Paléontologie et d’Anatomie comparée

One of the museums I have wanted to visit for a very long time now, is the Galerie de Paléontologie et d’Anatomie comparée. This is for a number of reasons, with the name one quite clearly discernible from the name…

#SciFri: Vanishing Viper Conference 2025

The adder (Vipera berus) is Britain’s only native venomous snake, which is having a bit of a tough time and suffers from a major image problem in the public media. Populations are patchy and concentrated in a mosaic of heathlands,…

#MuseumMonday: The Crab Museum

Regular readers of this blog and my #MuseumMonday feature will know that I love natural history. When visiting all the museums that I do, you tend to see the same information being presented in a very similar way. This can…

#MuseumMonday: Musée des Arts et Métiers

What do you do when you arrive in Paris and are waiting for your hotel check-in to open? You go to a museum of course! The Musée des Arts et Métiers in Paris (Conservatoire national des arts et métiers) is…

#MuseumMonday: Galerie de Géologie et de Minéralogie

One of my loves outside of herpetology is geology. It is a subject I studied at A-level and who doesn’t love collecting shiny rocks? My love for the subject is probably evident by my recent visit to the Lyme Regis…

#StevesLibrary: Top 10 Illegal Wildlife Trade Books

After a few conservations with some friends, I thought I’d do something a little different and put together a list of my Top 10 popular science books on the illegal wildlife trade. As a reminder, the illegal wildlife trade (IWT)…

#SciFri: Fossil Hunting at Abbey Wood for Shark’s Teeth

I’m no stranger to going fossil hunting on the coast, I know many of you have read my posts about the Essex and Kent coats. However, what about in the middle of London? I was fortunate enough to be invited…