Debbie Behler

Debbie Behler worked at the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Bronx Zoo for 39 years before retiring as the editor of Wildlife Conservation Magazine in 2009. She was married for 28 years to John Behler, Curator of Herpetology at the Bronx Zoo and the inspiration behind the Turtle Conservancy’s Behler Chelonian Center in Ojai. Debbie lives in New York’s northern Westchester County, where her neighbors call her the “turtle lady”, and where each spring brings her visits from her favorite chelonian—the Eastern Box Turtle (Terrapene carolina carolina). Once a year, Debbie talks to her grandchildren’s classes in the local schools about frogs and other herps.