Joseph T. Collins


Joseph Thomas Collins, Jr. was an American herpetologist. A graduate of the University of Cincinnati, Collins authored 27 books and over 300 articles on wildlife, of which about 250 were on amphibians and reptiles. He was the founder of the Center for North American Herpetology. He died while studying amphibians and reptiles on St. George Island, Florida on 14 January 2012. "For 60 years I was obsessed with herpetology," claimed Joe Collins

Early life

Collins recounted his early life in a 1997 interview: He was born to Luvadelle Bernice Collins of Crooksville, Ohio, and a podiatrist, Joseph T. Collins. He had two brothers, Jerry and Jeffery who were three and 16 years younger than he, respectively. He and his brother were excluded from Boy Scouts for being "too rowdy".. He caught his first snake, a queen snake, in a tin can around the age of 10-13. He had an avid interest in animals and collected so many animals, which he and his brothers housed in their backyard, that the City of Cincinnati shut them down for operating a zoo without a license. "You could get anything you wanted in those days," said Collins in regard to kinds of animals. At the time he had saved up $40 to buy an African Lion.

Career

He ended up in herpetology after shifting to keeping reptiles because they would fit in their basement. He believed this drove his ultimate interest in herpetology as a discipline. After high school, he attended the University of Cincinnati where he, by his own admission, lacked direction even though he had already started publishing scholarly scientific works at the age of 19. He credited ultimate direction as stemming from his own interests combined with his father's interest in fishing and outdoor activities. In 1967, he was hired as a vertebrate preparator by the University of Kansas Natural History Museum, where he worked for 30 years. He had already been corresponding with other herpetologists across the country. He earned his Associates from the University of Cincinnati, but had no further formal education.
He was among the group of young herpetologists and hobbyists including Kraig Adler who founded the Ohio Herpetological Society in 1958, which later developed into the largest herpetological society, the Society for the Study of Amphibians and Reptiles under Collins' leadership.
Collins' early books were not aimed at academics; they were aimed at the general public. He served as editor for numerous publications of the KUMNH, and of the Journal of Herpetology. He was a strong opponent of rattlesnake roundups that took place in western Kansas, calling them carnivals, and sponsored a bill in the Kansas Legislature to prohibit importation of non-native venomous snakes into Kansas. His journal articles cover all aspects of herpetology from natural history to systematics. He served as president of the SSAR in 1978, many SSAR committees, acting VP of the Herpetologists League. He was a major influence on many herpetologists including Kelly Irwin, Travis W. Taggart, and Emily Moriarty, Ph.D..
He did many benefit auctions for wildlife and environmental groups including the Wichita Audubon Society, Jayhawk Audubon Society, Society for Amphibians and Reptiles, Kansas Wildlife Federation and the Kansas Herpetological Society. After retirement, he served as a consultant for his consulting firm and performed public lectures around the country. At his peak he was giving around 250 lectures a year in Kansas alone. His most famous book is A Field Guide to Reptiles and Amphibians of Eastern and Central North America, Fourth Edition, which he coauthored with Roger Conant.

Controversy

Collins had chaired the committee that produced the SSAR Common and Scientific Names List from 1978 through 1982 with the consensus of the committee. In 1991, Collins released a new third edition to the names list in which he "...unilaterally changed from committee chairperson to author." Then, he published a recommendation for mass changes by elevating 55 allopatric distinctive subspecies to species rank in line with the developing evolutionary species concept. This created widespread controversy and debate among herpetologists, and he was removed as chair after production of the fourth edition in 1997. He continued to publish names lists following this philosophy through the Center for North American Herpetology; whereas, the SSAR continued to publish a list under their appointed committee structure. By 2009 there was serious strife about the conflicting versions of the names list, and Herpetologica published a series of SAs approaching the issue. Despite the controversy and debate, the vast majority of changes recommended by Collins were ultimately supported by the molecular evidence.

Honors and awards

Collins received several awards and honors, including:
In April 2012 following Collins' death, the Kansas Herpetological Society, of which Collins was a founding member, renamed its scholarly publication from Journal of Kansas Herpetology to Collinsorum in honor of Collins' contributions, and devoted the first newly named issue to remembrances and tributes of him.

Selected bibliography