wes_von_papineäu
Our Roving Correspondent
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NEW HAMPSHIRE PUBLIC RADIO (Concord) 07 April 08 In Search of the Yellow Spotted Salamander (Christina Russo)
On a recent rainy evening when most people were staying warm and dry inside, several brave souls were outside - traipsing and tip toeing through the woods.
They were learning about the wild and wondrous world that is the salamander migration.
(Radio excerpt follows)
(Sound of peepers and wood frogs blasting in the woods)
(KIDS) They’re doing the mating thing! OK. They’re just mating!. They’re probably annoyed that we’re looking at ‘em!
Welcome to the commentary that surrounds the amphibian mating season.
It arrived in Eastern Massachusetts last week thanks to weather that was 40 degrees plus at night… and wet.
And with the weather came eager onlookers.
They trudged down streets and into forests -- hoping to spy on little creatures like wood frogs, spring peepers and perhaps the most celebrated amphibian this time of year– the yellow-spotted salamander.
"The yellow spotted salamander’s life is one of darkness and dampness, they basically live underground all year long."
Bonnie Drexler is a naturalist at The Garden in the Woods in Framingham, a 45-acre sanctuary and the country’s oldest plant conservation organization.
We’re on a road close to the sanctuary.
Drexler’s been coming here for the last 14 years to witness what’s referred to as the annual salamander migration.
"They live in tunnels of shrews and moles -- coming out at night to eat worms and crickets and slugs. So, we don’t see them because they’re basically underground most of lives except for these few, warm rainy nights of the spring where they come out in masses -- hundreds of them come out of the woods at once to go into these little pools, vernal pools, and that’s where they come to mate."
The mating process for the yellow-spotted salamanders is far more complicated than one might imagine.
After the males come out of hibernation, they meander as far as a quarter-mile – probably by way of scent -- back to the same vernal pool where they were once hatched.
"The males usually cross over into the pools first and have something called a congress, where they all swim together and that triggers them to sort of get in the mood to start their breeding. And they lay these little packets of sperm on the edges of the pools and the little packets are called spermatophores and they look like a little dab of toothpaste right on top of the oak leaves." (screams of kids)
Drexler is unfazed by those kinds of reactions while she explains salamander mating.
She teaches kids for a living.
"When the females get together with the males they do a ritualized sort of a synchronized swimming together -- the male carries the female on its snout and dances her through the water and leads her over to where he’s deposited a spermatophore. And then she kinds of nestles up on top of it and it goes into a vent that she has underneath her tail and that’s how fertilization occurs."
How do the females know where they want to sit?
I think it must be related to the dancing -- the better dancers. And I’ve also read that sometimes the male will lead the female over to his spermatophore and then wiggle his tail allurgingly. So all those kinds of ritualized behaviors animals have. And you know - beauty is in the eye of the beholder….so I don’t really know what a female salamander would prefer!
The tadpoles turn into salamanders who then crawl out of the vernal pool.
Currently the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department considers vernal pools a critical habitat. But they are under constant threat because of development of buildings and roads.
Drexler says, if the yellow spotted salamander is going to survive, the vernal pools are going to have to remain.
"They’re sort of wonders of nature. The fact they‘ve been on the planet for tens of thousands of years, breeding in these same kinds of pools on these same rainy nights, it’s just kind of a renewal of the wonder that you can have about something that you don’t truly understand."
Yellow spotted salamanders can grow up to 9 inches and live up to twenty years.
Check in with your local conservation committee to find out where you might catch a glimpse of this mating ritual that has gone on for so many millennia.
The weather in New Hampshire is just about right.
To watch the migration one needs a flashlight, a raincoat and boots, a dollop of curiosity – and patience…
And if you miss this year’s migration, mark the date and protect the vernal pool.
It should happen again next year.
For NHPR News, I’m Christina Russo.
http://www.nhpr.org/node/15740
On a recent rainy evening when most people were staying warm and dry inside, several brave souls were outside - traipsing and tip toeing through the woods.
They were learning about the wild and wondrous world that is the salamander migration.
(Radio excerpt follows)
(Sound of peepers and wood frogs blasting in the woods)
(KIDS) They’re doing the mating thing! OK. They’re just mating!. They’re probably annoyed that we’re looking at ‘em!
Welcome to the commentary that surrounds the amphibian mating season.
It arrived in Eastern Massachusetts last week thanks to weather that was 40 degrees plus at night… and wet.
And with the weather came eager onlookers.
They trudged down streets and into forests -- hoping to spy on little creatures like wood frogs, spring peepers and perhaps the most celebrated amphibian this time of year– the yellow-spotted salamander.
"The yellow spotted salamander’s life is one of darkness and dampness, they basically live underground all year long."
Bonnie Drexler is a naturalist at The Garden in the Woods in Framingham, a 45-acre sanctuary and the country’s oldest plant conservation organization.
We’re on a road close to the sanctuary.
Drexler’s been coming here for the last 14 years to witness what’s referred to as the annual salamander migration.
"They live in tunnels of shrews and moles -- coming out at night to eat worms and crickets and slugs. So, we don’t see them because they’re basically underground most of lives except for these few, warm rainy nights of the spring where they come out in masses -- hundreds of them come out of the woods at once to go into these little pools, vernal pools, and that’s where they come to mate."
The mating process for the yellow-spotted salamanders is far more complicated than one might imagine.
After the males come out of hibernation, they meander as far as a quarter-mile – probably by way of scent -- back to the same vernal pool where they were once hatched.
"The males usually cross over into the pools first and have something called a congress, where they all swim together and that triggers them to sort of get in the mood to start their breeding. And they lay these little packets of sperm on the edges of the pools and the little packets are called spermatophores and they look like a little dab of toothpaste right on top of the oak leaves." (screams of kids)
Drexler is unfazed by those kinds of reactions while she explains salamander mating.
She teaches kids for a living.
"When the females get together with the males they do a ritualized sort of a synchronized swimming together -- the male carries the female on its snout and dances her through the water and leads her over to where he’s deposited a spermatophore. And then she kinds of nestles up on top of it and it goes into a vent that she has underneath her tail and that’s how fertilization occurs."
How do the females know where they want to sit?
I think it must be related to the dancing -- the better dancers. And I’ve also read that sometimes the male will lead the female over to his spermatophore and then wiggle his tail allurgingly. So all those kinds of ritualized behaviors animals have. And you know - beauty is in the eye of the beholder….so I don’t really know what a female salamander would prefer!
The tadpoles turn into salamanders who then crawl out of the vernal pool.
Currently the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department considers vernal pools a critical habitat. But they are under constant threat because of development of buildings and roads.
Drexler says, if the yellow spotted salamander is going to survive, the vernal pools are going to have to remain.
"They’re sort of wonders of nature. The fact they‘ve been on the planet for tens of thousands of years, breeding in these same kinds of pools on these same rainy nights, it’s just kind of a renewal of the wonder that you can have about something that you don’t truly understand."
Yellow spotted salamanders can grow up to 9 inches and live up to twenty years.
Check in with your local conservation committee to find out where you might catch a glimpse of this mating ritual that has gone on for so many millennia.
The weather in New Hampshire is just about right.
To watch the migration one needs a flashlight, a raincoat and boots, a dollop of curiosity – and patience…
And if you miss this year’s migration, mark the date and protect the vernal pool.
It should happen again next year.
For NHPR News, I’m Christina Russo.
http://www.nhpr.org/node/15740