Meet the crocodile man from Garden City

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 17/07/2017 (3313 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

World-renowned zoologist David Kirshner recently returned home to visit North End friends and family. 

The University of Manitoba graduate, who has illustrated many books with his carefully detailed drawings of bugs, reptiles and mammals, was born and educated in Winnipeg and obtained his PhD in zoology at the University of Sydney, in Australia.

 He now resides on the other side of the world. Australia is the place to be if you’re involved in the study of crocodiles and snakes. Yet every time Kirshner comes home, he always makes a trip to the Narcisse snake pit.

The Garden City Collegiate grad (1976) is also attending a reunion of the children of Cherryhill Road residents in Garden City, most of whom are now in their 50s and 60’.

Betty Kirshner and her late husband, Morris, were always supportive of son David’s passion. She said the family lived with snakes in their basement on Cherryhill, along with an assortment of other reptiles, a dog and an alligator.

 “We grew up with a zoo at our house,” she said and went on to say the Hydro man wouldn’t come to read the meter and her ladies’ club avoided meeting there.

She admitted that a python once escaped and hid in the walls of the house. They had to wait until it got hungry enough to allow itself to be trapped.

Kirshner is father to a 13-year-old daughter and says she has inherited his interest in drawing. The skilled illustrator has co-authored a book on alligators and crocodiles which recently won the Australian Whitley Medal for scientific publishing.

Because of his interests in all things crocodilian, Kirshner has travelled the world to photograph and study wildlife — South Africa, Indonesia, Thailand and elsewhere in southeast Asia, Namibia, South America and even Israel, where he took a day off from touring to seek out reptiles.

“I work in the zoo industry in charge of interpretation – educating the public about science,” he said. 

His main goal is the conservation of animals. 

“The more people know about something, the more they care about it,” he said.

 Kirshner, is a member of the International Union for Conservation of Nature, species survival commission, crocodile specialist group. He said crocodilians are a keystone species in their environment and some are endangered.

This in turn affects the survival of other animals and birds. The talented artist believes crocodiles are a link to our past. 

“They are really old but advanced,” he said. “They are the only reptiles that show extended parental care and have a complicated heart structure compared to ours.”

The dual citizen said that in his early years in Australia, he caught crocodiles by hand for research on his thesis. He also volunteered to catch kangaroos for Sydney University. Transmitters were attached to them before release.

Kirshner who has co-authored many books on animals, looks forward to future travel. 

“There’s a lot of wildlife I haven’t seen yet,” he said. 

Freda Glow is a community correspondent for the North End. 

Freda Glow
North End community correspondent

Freda Glow is a community correspondent for the North End.

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