Salamander Collecting Trip Photos

[Chris Anderson]

Well, I just recently got back from being in the field on a salamander collecting trip with my lab in Highlands, North Carolina and some surrounding areas so I thought I'd post some photos of a few of the salamanders we found. We found large numbers of most species and here are some of my favorite shots I was able to collect.

Notophthalmus viridescens (Red Eft):

Eurycea guttolineata (Three-Lined Salamander):

Desmognathus monticola (Seal Salamander):

Desmognathus ocoee (Ocoee Salamander):

Desmognathus wrighti (Pygmy Salamander):

Aneides aeneus (Green Salamander):

Plethodon metcalfi (Southern Gray-cheeked Salamander):

Plethodon serratus (Southern Red-backed Salamander):

Plethodon shermani (Red-legged Salamander):

Gyrinophilus porphyriticus (Spring Salamander):

In addition to the above species, we found Desmognathus quadramaculatus, Cryptobranchus alleganiensis, Pseudacris crucifer, Nerodia fasciata, Diadophis punctatus and Thamnophis sirtalis. We did not collect any of the species of special concern of course.

Hope you enjoyed the pics.

Chris

 

[coultrain]

those are some very cool pics. salamanders are so awsome and cool looking.

 

[royden]

Nice shots Chris!

 

[haleybobl]

Very pretty shots! I like the red legged one best.

 

[chamelisa]

Excellent photos and really nice specimens! I like the green salamander. The Red Eft is pretty awesome too. Actually, they all are except that some look like slugs with legs and I just don't like slugs.

How cold do you have to keep them? Do you have a special room to keep them in? Can you talk about the study you're doing?

I don't know of anyone keeping salamanders out here except for Dr. Lee Katz from Pepperdine. He was a speaker for our herp society a couple of years ago. Very funny guy.

 

[hallenhe]

Thanks for all the loverly salamander photos! My husband is an on-again, off-again salamander hobbyist; at present we have a tiger salamander, Oregon newt and two paddletail newts; he has also had fire salamander, firebelly newts, axolotl and others. We have several wild species in Michigan, but nowhere near the diversity or abundance of the Southeast.
My favorites of the Caudata with which I have any personal experience are the genus Ambystoma (particularly the tiger salamander); big, beautiful and interesting behavior.

 

[AJA]

No Eastern Tiger Salamanders in your hunt? I have a pair I am looking to re-home, I could ship them back to you for your inventory

-just joking guys.

 

[Artemis]

Great salamander pics! We love looking for salamanders around our house and woods. We call my herp obsessed son Commander Salamander.

Thanks for sharing the photos.

 

[Chris Anderson]

My own research is on ballistic tongue projection in chameleons but my advisor works primarily with ballistic tongue projection in salamanders. We are mostly interested in the Plethodontid (lungless) Salamanders because those are the ones with tongues that are projected out like that. So while we didn't find any Ambystomatid Salamanders, we wouldn't have collected them if we had (we didn't collect the red eft either). You can see some of the videos of salamanders feeding here: http://www.autodax.net/feedingmovieindex.html

We do have a cold room to keep the Salamanders. The room is kept at around 64F. There are actually a lot of biologists who work with Salamanders, you'd be surprised.

Thanks for all the compliments on the photos!

Chris

 

[sandrachameleon]

Thanks for sharing Chris. Lovely photos.