Northwest Wildlife Online
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WELCOME to Northwest Wildlife Online and thank you for stopping by. My name is John M. Regan, but call me "Jack," the nickname I've had since before birth, I believe. I am your host for what I hope will be your number one stop for the information and news on wildlife in the Northwest. I started this website a couple of years ago with this mission in mind: "Each month NWWOL will bring you up to date on the wide variety of fauna in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and British Columbia." Things have changed a bit since then, however, and I've expanded the site to other parts of the world. So far it's been a wonderful and fascinating jopurney.
I'm probably best described as a world traveler who's come full circle. Like most people who are passionate about a particular subject, my fascination came to light at an early age. In my case it happened at the ripe old age of four. I was playing in our backyard when our next door neighbor discovered a big garter snake. I'm sure he sought to encourage a youthful scientific curiosity when he showed me the reptile, but my horrified mother quickly banished man and serpent to the woods behind our house. Enormously disappointed, I waited in agony for my father to come home from work. As soon as he pulled in the driveway I insisted we journey into the woods and find the astounding creature. And much to my father's dismay we did - curled under a log exactly where it had been released as if waiting for me to come back.
That snake opened a passion for animals led me to devour every book I could on the subject. I collected frogs, toads, snakes, salamanders, insects, you name it. If it lived it upstate New York and was not human I had to get my hands on it. Eventually it led to a job as Curator of Hoofstock under Jack Hanna back in the seventies and a degree in biology. I knew I'd found my life's work.
But life takes unexpected paths. Instead of a zoo I found a home in the Army. For 23 years it was my life and profession, and might have been for 23 more were it not for a peculiar set of circumstances while stationed in South Korea in the late nineties. While still a soldier I found myself training elephants and rhinoceroses. The passion still lurking under the skin exploded back to life.
It's been many (too many) years since the sight of that garter snake. At last I've returned to it again, but this time I'm staying, fascinated like you by all things animal and forever trying to learn. I hope that through this website I can give something back to that snake, those elephants, and all the animals and people who've meant so much to me.
But I guess I have a fairly restless soul as well as one enamored by the natural world, and my wandering star was not quite ready to stay put. Ask any soldier and he or she will tell you that two years in one place is probably about all they can take. Stick someone like that into the world of corporate America and he can take even less. So less than two years after I "retired" I headed to Saudi Arabia. A year after that stint I was (and still am) in Afghanistan. The wildlife adventure, however, has not stopped and I hope you enjoy the natural history beauty I have found in some unlikely places.
HOOAH
Jack
Birds Mammals Reptiles Amphibians Fish Invertebrates Library NWWOL Online Store Home
Mission Editor Bio Site Map Contact Wildlife Park Links Further Study Wild Employment Northwest Trek