Gopher frogs

Figured it's time to post again even though absolutely NOTHING is happening at the drift fences.  Still dry and cold.  We did get some snow on Sunday which is really unusual for here, but it didn't amount to much.  Certainly not enough to affect water levels!  Took these photos of a couple gopher frogs, Rana capito, we have in captivity for the winter.  They were born last spring at Craig's Pond--one of the largest bays on site.  They will be released back there this spring, but most likely with some radio transmitters on their backs so Kurt Buhlmann can look at their movements and use of the uplands away from the pond.  Gopher frogs are quite rare and there is a lot of interest in learning more about their habitat requirements and general ecology. Their name comes from their association with Gopher tortoises--they use their burrows!  They are considered endangered, threatened, or at risk in every state in which they occur.  The closely related Mississippi (or dusky) gopher frog, Rana sevosa, used to occur along the gulf coast states but is now federally endangered and restricted to only a few remaining populations.   Hopefully Rana capito won't suffer the same fate, but in SC there are only two main places where these gorgeous frogs can even be found: the Savannah River Site and Francis Marion National Forest.  We only have a few known ponds with gopher frogs on the SRS but we are actively trying to get some tissue samples for DNA so we can get a feel for the genetic health of the remaining populations and compare the populations here and at Francis Marion.  Fellow blogger, David Scott and I are doing the genetic work along with Stephen Richter at Eastern Kentucky University.  Stephen has a lot of experience with the Mississippi gopher frogs and hopefully together we can all learn more about these awesome frogs.

Shrew vs. the salamander

I may not have mentioned it before but marbled salamanders have a nice "goo" on them that is supposed to be distasteful.  They, like some other Ambystomatid salamanders produce noxious secretions thought to deter predators. After handling them my hands have a nice coating of their secretions and it basically looks like you're just dirty--it gets dried and black and pretty hard to get off.  As an aside getting it into your eyes is NOT recommended.  On Friday we caught a shrew in a bucket and decided to see what it would do. Shrews are common predators of salamanders and it's been shown they don't seem to get used to the secretion, but also don't let it deter them.  I've uploaded the video to you tube and you can watch it here. It is clear that the shrew finds the salamander distasteful but irresistible at the same time!  It "tastes" the salamander then rubs it mouth like crazy but comes right back.  Pretty cool to watch.  Rest assured neither the shrew nor the salamander were injured in the making of this film! 

Frozen gators

I thought when I moved to SC from Maine I was heading to a warmer place!  This week it's warmer up there.  We are really having some crazy southern weather.  Didn't get out of the 30's today and ridiculous wind to go with it.  Reminded me of a cold snap we had last winter where the ponds we have out behind the lab froze over for a couple weeks.  In those ponds we have a male and female pair of alligators and some of their offspring.  Many of us took the opportunity to get into the enclosure and take some photos assuming the cold would have them moving pretty darn slowly.  Here are a couple of the photos I took then. One shows the male entirely under the ice except for the breathing hole he created.  In the second one the female had been completely under the ice but when we got a bit too close she broke through and gave us a warning to stay away from her and her babies.  You can see a chunk of ice on her head.  Gators here are pushing the edge of their range so this is not a normal occurrence for them.  Hopefully we'll warm up and get some rain so we can get back to amphibian field work!

It's freezing in SC!

Not much to report lately since it is ridiculously cold for here.  We've gone from unseasonably warm to unseasonably cold very quickly.   Supposed to be 19 degrees F (-7 C) tonight.  Not exactly the best weather for amphibians to be moving around.  The really unusual part for here is that the low is going to be below freezing the rest of the week.  I suspect we'll continue to get a lot of invertebrates in the buckets and the occasional bullfrog juvenile trying to make its way across the landscape. Just for fun here is a cool photo where the color of the bucket causes interesting effects.  It's is a bucket full of leopard frogs from the H-02 wetlands. The photo was taken by David Scott--the person who is really in charge of running and managing the Rainbow Bay study.

Camel crickets everywhere

I got to escape the lab and head to Rainbow Bay today to help check buckets and release some of the 200 or so marbled salamanders that were caught leaving the bay the other day.  We had about 16mm of rain the other night so a bunch of males (and one female) decided it was time to leave the bay.  The males leave before the females----males leave after the mating season is over, but females will continue to stick around and protect their nests for a while.  If we don't get a lot of rain soon even they will eventually give up and leave their nests.  Previous research by major bay runner David Scott has shown that the nests do not do as well without female attendance, but he also showed that females are not eating during this time.  So basically if the rains don't come to fill the bay and stimulate the eggs to hatch, the females eventually have to give up and go.  It's raining a little right now, not enough to do much, but may have more  males taking off tomorrow and I'll be curious to see if females start to go soon.  As usual, even though the bay is dry the buckets were full of invertebrates.  Today seemed to be camel cricket day.  They were in a lot of the buckets.  You can see they have huge "thighs," a humped back, and harder to see, really long antennae.  I think they're pretty cool, most people come across them in their basements and don't seem to think so, but they don't chirp so it's not like they can be considered annoying.  Though I even enjoy the chirping cricket in the basement.

A new bay to explore!!!

Today four of us got to explore a bay that only one of us had ever been to before--and that was many years ago.  We're about to start a new project looking at amphibians in a bay that is contaminated with coal fly ash and we  need a "reference" bay that's nearby, similar habitat but no ash.  Went to check out Bay 100 (we have incredibly exciting bay names eh?) and were all stunned to find water!  It did rain last night but most bays are still bone dry.  In fact Ellenton Bay is now so dry you have to dig to -69 on the depth gauge to find water.  Anyway, Bay 100 is absolutely gorgeous.  It's somewhat amorphous--just a meandering bay right now--full of cypress trees.  It almost felt like walking on a bog, very spongy.  Didn't see any signs of amphibians yet, but we didn't exactly come prepared to find water so we didn't have dip nets etc.  I'm pretty excited to put up some drift fences here and at the nearby contaminated bay and start adding these to our regular sampling routine for a while.  Hopefully we'll have some good finds.  Hope you enjoy the photos--the light was great, not sure I captured it, but mostly it's just never-ending cypress with Spanish moss.  Really, really pretty.

Was all excited for the "big rain" we were to get over the weekend.  It only amounted to a total of 4.4mm over two days--not much to talk about.  It did make it wet enough for 40 or so marbled salamanders to leave the bay, but not much else moving.  It's sprinkling tonight and rumor has it it may rain tomorrow and Wednesday.  I'm not going to hold my breath.  But as I've said before we can always count on a ton of invertebrates to be at the fence.  We typically have a LOT of millipedes and centipedes in the buckets.  Today I tried to get a video of a centipede--they move really fast so it's not exactly in focus but at least it shows their  cool movement.  enjoy.

Happy Thanksgiving!

On Thanksgiving day I'll be thankful for many things including the wonderful invertebrates that are always at the drift fence--hot, cold, dry, or wet they are always there to keep things interesting.  We get a ton of these very large crickets and are now getting a lot of what I'll naively just call wooly bears.  Looks like our crazy summer weather should come to an end tomorrow and we'll get back to normal temperatures and some rain.  Hopefully that will mean some amphibian action for Saturday.  Rain may even come tonight so one of our dutiful bay runners (not me) got to work at the crack of dawn today to process the salamanders that left the bay the other day to make sure they got released before the next rain. Keeping the Rainbow Bay fence going is quite the commitment--no holidays missed in 30 years!


Hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving!

At least mice come out to play when it's dry!

78 degrees today and dry as a bone--needless to say not the ideal weather for amphibians.  But we managed to get one southern toad and one green frog leaving the bay and one very late marbled salamander entering the bay.  A fun find was this adorable Peromyscus in one of the buckets--must admit I have a soft spot for mice.  It was very nervous, but quite healthy and happy to be released back into the woods.  We don't get these very often in the buckets, get a few shrews here and there, but not that many mice.  We get a mix of Peromyscus on site with most being white-footed mouse, cotton mouse, or oldfield mouse. 

At least the mice are active in this drought.  To give a feel for just how dry it is--Brian went to Ellenton bay the other day and went to the water gauge in the deepest part of the "wetland."  He dug down to -40 inches and still hadn't reached water.  Doesn't bode well.  Really hoping to get more Gopher frog samples this spring but will need water for that!

It's good to have an incubator

I really really wanted to post something yesterday because we went into the H02 wetlands looking for green treefrogs (Hyla cinerea) and found a few.  I needed a little tissue for DNA extractions but they are so photogenic I figured they'd be perfect for the blog.  That was a great plan until my camera fell into the water.  Yep, totally submerged and covered in duckweed.  Brought it back to the lab and pulled out the battery and memory card and put everything into my 37 degree incubator.  Twenty-four hours later it worked great!!!  No wetlands today but have a couple photos of fall plant life. The club moss is from around Rainbow Bay, but have to confess the Mexican marigold is just from my yard---just had to test that the camera is indeed dry and functional! 

The opacum are already starting to leave!

Got a whole 8mm of rain yesterday.  Went to Rainbow Bay first thing this morning and really didn't expect to see too many marbled salamanders.  figured they used last night to play the  mating game and on the next rainy night they'd start leaving the bay.  Turns out a few had had enough already.  Totally surprised to find several "handfuls" of salamanders in the first few buckets. Still had a few stragglers just now making it into the bay as well!  Plus a bunch of bull frog juveniles passing through.  Plus the newt we saw enter the bay a few weeks ago decided it was time to go.   It will certainly take a LOT more than 8mm of rain to get the bay to start filling.  Such is the life of a pond-breeding amphibian, some years things work out, some years they don't.  This year isn't lookin' so good.

Maybe some salamander love tonight

So far we're still seeing more reptiles than amphibians at the drift fences.  Getting several Anolis each day (like the one in the photo) and at the H02 wetlands there were two garter snakes the other day.  Unfortunately I wasn't there and didn't get a photo.  But a miracle happened today---it rained!  Not sure how much we got, were supposed to get about a half an inch.  No way the bay will start filling yet, but hopefully the marbled salamanders can at least come out from hiding and play the mating game.  Should be some nests being built tonight!  If so, on the next few rainy nights the male salamanders may start leaving the bay while the females will stick around and tend to their nests.

Well even if I can't share awesome salamander photos during our drought I can at least share the wonderful fall days we've been having.  It's been absolutely glorious with days in the 70's and nights in the 30's.  Even with nothing going on in the Bay I've been trying to go often just for an excuse to get outside.  Today we returned some salamanders that were caught over the last week or so---just a few stragglers that came in and needed to be processed.  The cool thing was that one female actually laid a few eggs in the bin we had them in.  That's how desperate they are--put them in a bin with wet paper towels and it's the closest thing they've seen to good breeding conditions!  Just a few eggs so hopefully when it finally does rain she'll still have plenty of eggs to lay.  Slight chance of rain Monday!  I'll be keeping my fingers crossed.

Missing the rain

Looks like I picked the wrong year to start blogging about drift fences!  Today it's 75 degrees and dry.  Been that way for a while and all forecasts suggests we'll have a very dry winter.  It's the La Niña aftermath of our wonderfully wet El Niño year last year.  I feel bad for the over 1500 salamanders that made the trek to the bay and are now just hanging out waiting for a rainy night to set the mood for a night of salamander lovin'.  In thinking of all those salamanders I figured I'd share another photo from the big migration day.  Each bin you see on the right has anywhere from 50-100 marbled salamanders (and one slimy salamander and a few bullfrog juveniles).  On the left is Brett DeGregorio who has been helping run the fence lately (and he's a New England Patriots fan like me so we're still recovering from Sunday's awful game).

Fence Repair

Back from Missouri and was happy to get a chance to go back out to Rainbow Bay.  Gorgeous fall day so it was a great excuse to be outside for a bit.  We haven't had rain since a few days ago so there wasn't much to speak of in the buckets but it was a great day to do some fence repair.  Maintaining drift fences can actually be a lot of work.  Over time each bucket needs to be replaced, trees fall on sections of fence, holes show up under sections of fence etc etc.  The guys got most of the outer buckets fixed before the marbleds moved into the bay and now it's time to make sure all the inside buckets are in good shape before they come back out of the bay.  In the photos you can see the progression from upper left then clockwise where you dig out the old bucket, put in a new bucket--which needs to be flush with the fence, put a new sheet of fence over a worn out stretch and pack sand and dirt all around, and then replace all the leaf litter around the bucket so that hopefully you can barely tell anything happened.  sounds pretty simple but I'm always impressed with the care that goes into the process.  It's really critical that the bucket is as flush as possible to the fence, otherwise something the size of a salamander can walk along the fence and not fall in the bucket.  It's also really important to pack the sand and dirt down to make the surrounding area flush with the bucket top--even after rain and trampling--same basic reason--a salamander walking along the ground that bumps into the lip of a bucket isn't going to fall in! 

Miserable in Missouri

Our fearless leader, Stacey Lance, is away at a conference in Kansas City teaching the world about genetics and is unable to blog. Brian Metts and I will fill in while she's gone. We were excited to check the fences this morning as its been raining all night with at least 2 cm accumulated so far. However, when we met this morning to go check the drift fence we realized that David Scott beat us to the punch. David, afraid that the buckets may have filled up and could possible drown salamanders, had arrived very early and run the fence. He found 15 marbled salamanders in the buckets, fewer than we had expected. We think this may signify that the animals headed to the pond to breed this year have already made their move. As its going to continue to rain for the next day or so, we'll keep our fingers crossed that we get one more pulse of animals heading to the wetland, but it may be quiet for a while.

We'll head out tomorrow to see if the bay is filling up yet....

Manders strutting their styles

Well there's still not much happening at the fences due to lack of rain. We may have some tonight or tomorrow and I'll be out of town (conference in KC) so hopefully Brett, Brian or David will let everyone know what's happening.

In previous posts I've mentioned that every marbled salamander has a unique pattern--which is why we can use photos to ID individuals.  Robert Horan gave me this photo the other day and it perfectly illustrates how variable the patterns can be.  The one in the upper left has very little white down the middle and the white is actually pretty gray which usually is the case for females.  Then the one on the right is more white than black with very thick "dog bones" across the back.  On the bottom you have what I consider the more typical "dog bone" pattern with thin white bars that go across the back and are thicker on the ends--hence the dog bone.  All three of these have a decent amount of white/gray on their heads, but that is something else that can vary a ton.  Hopefully some day we can actually do some work to figure out more about why they have such different patterns and whether it matters for mate choice or competition among males.

Manders by the handful

Things are still quiet in the field since the big movement in almost a week ago.  A few stragglers show up every day, but no big events.  Today there were more Anolis than anything else since it was an absolutely gorgeous sunny in the high 70's.  Good day for trick or treating!  Think my last trick or treaters just left.  For those of you that live closer to the edge of the range for marbled salamanders it can be hard to imagine just how many a single wetland can have here.  Hopefully today's photos helps put it in perspective---these are just some of the salamanders from a single bin so from no more than 3 buckets.  Pretty crazy.  I spent years trying to get tissue samples from fox squirrels and gray foxes--after a couple years I had about 300 fox samples.  I can get my hands on more marbled salamanders than that in about a minute!!!  I started studying amphibians in college, glad to be back to them---just can't beat that sample size, plus they are just wicked cool.
Happy Halloween!
Photo comes from Robert Horan.

It wasn't just opacum diggin' the rain

The other night when it rained we got a more than just marbled salamanders.  Got a  handful of bullfrog juveniles and a slimy salamander.  But the great find for the  night was a newt.  Way back when the drift fence at Rainbow Bay was first put in red-spotted newts were quite common, now they are very rare.  This one was just hanging out on the "flotation device" and was incredibly cooperative for his photo shoot.  Pulled the wood out of the bucket and he just hung out, then we managed to get a marbled salamander to join the fun.  Love it when you can get multi-species photos.  At first there was a beetle using the newt as a couch, would have been great to have the beetle, newt, and marlbed salamander all together but critters don't always think of our photo ops. 

Anyway, not much has happened at the fence since the rain earlier this week.  Mostly David has been frantically measuring and photographing the over 1500 that came in and then releasing them as soon as possible.  No rain in site so it should be quiet.

Both photos are from Maria Ruiz-Lopez. 

Marbled salamanders lovin’ the rain

Some more photos from Monday night.  Without video it’s a bit tough to capture the behavior that was going on as the salamanders came to the fence from the woods, but I’ll try to give a feel for it from stills.  First, thanks to Maria Ruiz-Lopez, a postdoc visiting the lab from Univ. of Missouri to do some genetic work on raccoon MHC.  Maria took all of the above photos.  Ok, so looking at the top left you have two salamanders interacting.  They were kind of sizing each other up, moving alongside each other and then they kind of go head to tail and “circle” around each other.  Moving clockwise in photo two you’ve got the same two animals together but note you’ve got 3 more heading their way, then in the next photo one has joined the party so you have 3 interacting and 2 heading in.  Moving down to the bottom left now you have 4 interacting and moving all over each other and 1 just about ready to join the fun.  In the next photo all 5 are partaking in the opacum fun, but it was very temporary and in the next photo you can see the group is dispersing.  This was going on all over the place Monday night.  Unfortunately almost every time we came up to them with our bright headlamps they refused to play along and stopped what they were doing.  We found spermatophores all over the place too.  Like most nights of big migrations it was clear that males were showing up first and then females later.  Too bad for the boys, I think most of their spermatophores were wasted!   May have more rain tonight, we’ll see how many more are waiting to come in.  Pretty sure about 1500 came in Monday and already about 1000 had dribbled in over the previous weeks.  Just glad I’m not the one measuring, weighing, and photographing almost every one of them!  It’s easier to write about it!

Rain!!! It finally rained!

Thought it would  never happen, but we finally got some rain today.  Had some good downpours and thunderstorms.  I know not everyone is so thrilled for rain, but we were long overdue---and the salamanders seemed to be getting desperate.  First thing that needed to get done is the guys had to finish “processing” the over 400 that came into the bay the other day because tonight will likely be a good night for mating so they really wanted to get those manders back out there.  David returned them around 5pm today and saw that new animals were already moving into the bay and some males were already doing some mating behavior.  Again, this isn’t the norm around here---you’d expect them not to start moving and mating until later at night, but I guess when you finally get some rain you go for it.  Several of us went out tonight to see what’s going on, collect some of them from the buckets so there won’t be too many in the buckets in the morning, and to make sure they all have “flotation devices.”  I have a postdoc from Univ. of Missouri visiting this week so I took her out and she loved it!  She had a much better camera with her than I did so tomorrow I’ll post some better photos.  They were moving every where you looked--so much so that you had to walk very carefully and shine your light everywhere you are thinking about stepping. You can pick up all the ones along one stretch of fence, then turn around and do it again b/c there are so many moving around.  It’s just really cool when you think about the fact they were out in the woods out of sight just a bit ago and then like magic they all show up in one place.  We just got back a while ago and plan is to be back out there early tomorrow so the photos tonight are a bit rushed---basically starting in the upper left and going clockwise you’ve got: a bucket full, three that had been hanging out together by the fence until I showed up and they started moving apart, one about to drop into a bucket full, two that were doing a bit of the circular motion mating display, one climbing over a log, and one literally on the fence.  Salamanders rock. 

Cricket frog day

The fall season at Rainbow Bay continues to be confusing.  A few more marlbed salamanders came in but the winner today was the southern cricket frog, Acris gryllus.  We don’t get a ton of these in the buckets, but tend to see them hopping all over the place near the fence. They are one of the species that can hop the fence so we have some basic data on their numbers at the bay, but nothing as detailed as we do for many other species. They have some serious “ups” and watching someone try to catch one can be pretty entertaining.  I was the entertainment today as I tried to grab a bunch of them.  They let you get nice and close and then ‘sproing’ and you are left empty handed, but convinced you’ll get them before the next jump.  Works for me with about half of them and then other half I give up on. We probably had about 10 or so at the fence today and a few yesterday and aren’t really sure what has them moving around. It’s not their breeding season and it’s still as dry as can be outside.  Cricket frogs are really cool and they have a ton of different color patterns--check this out to see a couple of really beautiful ones. Around here it can also get confusing because we get both northern and southern cricket frogs and they can be tough to tell apart.

It is actually supposed to rain tomorrow but given the way the season is going probably no marbleds will move tomorrow night!  We’ll see.

Marbled salamanders (and spermatophores) with no rain!

 We’re all learning a lot about marbled salamanders this year!  Everything you’d ever read about them says they won’t migrate to their wetland unless it rains and they don’t mate except on rainy nights.  This year we had a movement of over 350 last week with no rain---but there was a front moving through.  Last night was an even bigger migration and there was no rain at night.  We had a few sprinkles during the day at the lab, but the rain gauge at the bay said NO rain.  Yet, this morning three of us went out together because we just had that sense that last night may have been the closest thing to the right conditions that we’ve had yet.  Sure enough we got several hundred.  And man are the males ready!  If you look closely at the picture on the top you can spot several spermatophores.  The most obvious one is toward the upper right part--basically look for the bright white spot.  The males put down a spermatophore which has a base that looks like a clear jelly and then the sperm packet is on the top.  The females have to position themselves over a spermatophore and pick up the sperm packet. We put “floats” in all of the buckets--usually a piece of wood and in this case the males were using the floats as a mating ground!  Unfortunately for them, most of the sperm was left on the base so doesn’t look like the females were quite as ready as the males.  As an aside last year David Scott and I had a study going in which we collected every spermatophore put down by males in enclosures--now I have boxes and boxes of hundreds of spermatophores I need to extract DNA from.  It’ll be a cool study when I finally get back to it! 

The picture on the bottom shows all the bins we used today to bring the manders back to the lab.  Brian Metts is posing with the buckets.  Brian is one of the guys who has “run” Rainbow Bay the most over the years.

Bin o’ manders

Well David finished processing the over 350 marbled salamanders that Brian found at the fence on Friday so I got to help do another release today.  We know there are nearly 500 in Rainbow Bay now this season, but it’s not likely any mating has occurred since it remains bone dry out there.  I always enjoy releasing them--as you can see in the photo they tend to pile up together in the bins, but as soon as you release them they head their own way.  Today there was one smallish male that absolutely took off upon release.  It was hysterical to watch, usually the wriggle a little ways and quickly start to burrow under leaf litter--this little dude just booked--he must have covered a few feet in just a few seconds.  A friend was there with me and we both started cracking up watching this guy run for it.  Not sure where he was headed but he seemed to be on a mission---figure maybe he had some personal space issues and the bin environment had taken its toll and he was overwhelmed with joy to be free of his fellow manders!  That was a  case where I wish I had some video.

The opacum must be crazy!

 What a crazy marbled salamander season!  It is bone dry outside--even the normal humidity we experience here is gone--yet yesterday Brian found over 350 salamanders at Rainbow Bay (see his comment on entry from 10-14).  When we bring the salamanders from the field to the lab we put them in ziplock bags or plastic bins with lots of moist paper towels--like the stack of bins in the upper right photo.  When Brian put the marbleds in bins it seems they were thrilled for some moisture at long last. By the time he got back to SREL there were spermatophores in the bins!  Males weren’t going to pass up the opportunity.  Yesterday was really the first day a reasonable number of females starting showing up.  Today I got to help release a lot of the sals caught yesterday.  As mentioned before--they get brought back to the lab to be “processed”--meaning many of them get to pose for photos, get weighed, and get measured.  It’s really fun to release them, we clear a little spot in the leaf litter, put them down and watch them go--as in the photo in the bottom.  They are pretty quick to start burrowing their way under the litter--you can see this a little in the brief video I uploaded to You Tube.  One of the sals found yesterday was really unique--all of them have unique patterns but this one was nearly entirely black which only happens about 1 out of every 3,000 sals.  The one in the picture in the middle had very faint white bands across it’s tail but other than that it was all black. Pretty cool find.

Redbellied snake

Our dry spell continues but today there were a couple of snakes to be found and more desperate marbled salamanders came to Rainbow Bay.  The above picture is quite out of focus (sorry) but is of a Redbellied snake, Storeria occipitomaculata.  Two of these have been spotted this week, one at dry bay and one today at the H-02 wetlands.  These snakes remain pretty small and mostly eat slugs.  There was also a Black Racer at H-02 today.  Unfortunately I didn’t get to see it since I didn’t help run the bays today!  Figures it would work that way.  At least I got to see the Redbellied snake from Dry Bay since it was brought back to the lab.  There is a very slight chance of rain tonight so hopefully more than a handful of marbleds will come to the bay tomorrow.  I may have to start investigating to see if those that have entered have starting mating and laying eggs.  Hard for me to imagine them going through their courtship behavior in the bone dry nights we’ve had, but desperate times....

Still no rain....

..and it is starting to look like the marlbed salamanders are getting desperate.  Absolutely no rain for days and yesterday was hotter than it’s been in a week or so, yet there were about 10-15 marbleds at the drift fence today!  Was pretty surprising, but it’s getting close to the time of year where they’ll move without the right conditions because time’s running short.  Another week or so and we can expect that with any rain at all they’ll come in in bigger numbers.  Also found a surprising number of bullfrog juveniles today---in the bucket pictured above we found one salamander and three bullfrogs---initially all were sharing the same piece of floating wood but only one stayed for a photo!  Not surprising there were also a bunch of Anolis running around.  Had a visitor at the lab last week from Asheville, NC and she said the marbleds have already entered the wetlands in big numbers up there--makes sense they’d be well ahead of us.  I hope the forecast changes---no rain in sight for a week at least.  Not looking great for the marbleds!

Lizard weather

Well it hasn’t rained in over a week and there’s no rain in sight---so, no salamanders to speak of.  But with the fantastic sunny weather we have been seeing a lot of Anolis lizards at both Rainbow Bay and the H-02 wetlands.  Many of them are clearly the young from this year and none of them were willing to pose for a photo.  The one in the upper left was actually one of the biggest Anolis I’ve seen here.  At the H-02 we also got to see this great fence lizard.  I don’t get to see them nearly as often.  If you like these guys you can read more about the Anolis or Sceloporus.  Hopefully we’ll get some rain eventually, I’m more than eager to find buckets full of marlbed salamanders!

Snazzy opacum photos

About thirty more desperate male marbled salamanders came into Rainbow Bay today.  Our brief chance of rain came and went without a drop.  Only warning on the weather channel now is for high risk of fire!  In other words, it’s going to stay dry for a while.  Thought I’d show you what these guys look like when they get their photos taken.  All of them are put on the same background (some red felt), illuminated from above, and a counter is kept in the field of view.  All marlbeds coming into the bay that have a cohort mark (meaning they were born in the bay and have been marked in a way that we know what year they were born).  The critter on the left is a one-year old and on the left is a three-year old.  These two have fairly similar patterns but still you can tell them apart by the patterns of the white “bars” across their backs and the amount of white on the head.  Since the “cohort” mark doesn’t provide an individual mark the photos can serve that purpose.  Also just shows how incredibly beautiful they are!  Ok, time to do a rain dance.

Praying Mantis

Yet another gorgeous fall day in SC!  Tagged along to run Rainbow Bay just to have an excuse to get outside in the field.  Did get one marbled salamander, a couple more bullfrog juveniles, and some Anolis lizards running along the fence, but the highlight for me today was this gorgeous paying mantis.  Wasn’t at the drift fence--we stopped to take some plant cuttings (Baptesia, Sassafras, and a Vaccinium)--and saw this critter just hanging out.  It stayed put for me to take a lot of photos which I really appreciated. I think this time of year is when their mating season is so hopefully they’ll be out and about more often.

Beautiful fall day...

The morning light was gorgeous on the ride to Rainbow Bay, but no salamanders.  Back to dry weather and no rain in the forecast for the weekend so no more marbled salamanders likely to enter the bay.  Did get a few juvenile bullfrogs in the buckets.  At one of our wetlands, the H-02 constructed wetlands, we’re getting bullfrog metamorphs coming out so this seems to be the time for them.  Bullfrogs don’t reproduce at Rainbow Bay because the hydroperiod (the length of time the bay holds water) isn’t long enough for them.  They breed in the late spring and need several months to develop.  Many of the bays on the SRS typically dry up too quickly for bullfrogs to succeed.  When we see them at Rainbow Bay they are usually juveniles moving through the landscape from other nearby wetlands.

Still slow going...

.....at the drift fence.  Yesterday was a gorgeous clear day so no marbleds moving last night.   Did get to go release some from the other day.  In the above picture the salamanders on the left, in the plastic bin, have just had their photos taken and been measured. Then on the right is immediately post release.  It’s a blast to release them, after clearing a little leaf litter away we scatter a handful on the ground and watch them scurry.  I tried to take the photo before they got under the leaves, but they were too fast!  Most of the ones above on the right look headless!  Toss the leaves back over them and you can’t even tell they’re there.  Seeing that disappearing act always reminds me how much can be around us in the woods that we never see.  There was a little rain today but none in the forecast for tonight so probably only a few salamanders in the morning---on the plus side there’s no need to get there at the crack of dawn!

The season is under way!

Well, we didn’t get inundated with opacum, but I think the season has officially started.  Probably got between 100 and 150 marbled salamanders today--and a handful of Southern toads.  Was a nice easy transition into the mayhem that awaits.  Unfortunately the rain came down so torrentially yesterday that it just flooded most of the pitfall traps.  A flooded bucket doesn’t really make for much of a trap!  More time was spent bailing buckets than grabbing salamanders.  Well, I should be clear, I didn’t have to bail a single bucket.  I’m pretty much along for the ride when it comes to running the fence.  Not my job, I just love to help because I think it’s a really cool thing and I’ve got several research projects tied into the Rainbow Bay data set.  Anyway, the numbers were easy to handle, but it rained all day today so there will be more waiting in the morning.  I don’t think we ever had more than about 15 in a bucket today and that will surely change over the next few weeks.  Every marbled salamander coming into Rainbow Bay is brought back to the lab where it is photographed and a subset are measured.  If you look at the photo---better photos to come, I promise-- the white pattern you see is unique to every individual so by taking the photograph you essentially end up with an individual identification.  very cool, but a lot of tedious work.  Hopefully we’ll break 200 tomorrow.

Rain is here, tomorrow will be an early morning

Well the rain didn’t come until this morning and even then it was just a shower.  Only had one marbled salamander in the pitfall traps.  It was a youngster--it’s toe clip marking showed it to be one of the metamorphs from this past spring.  So far that’s who’s been showing up.  Usually that’s the case--the metamorphs leave the bay in the spring and don’t go very far in their first year.  As a result when it comes time to return to the bay they don’t have as far to travel.  The adults have further to go and for a lot of them it will take multiple rainy nights to make the trip.  Imagine only being able to travel when it rains!  You go as far as you can in one evening, hang out under some leaves and logs until the next rain, move a little further and so on until you reach your destination.  It’s rainy pretty good this evening and should continue for a while.  If I were at the bay right now I could watch them making their migration, but I’ll stick with watching the Red Sox game.  Hopefully there will be a good number of critters in the pitfall traps tomorrow morning.  All the adults that were ready to go and within one night’s distance could arrive.  On big nights it’s important to get to the drift fence first thing in the morning---the salamanders can get overheated as the day heats up and if you have a lot in one trap they can actually drown.  Good thing I think marbled salamanders are wicked cool because the plan is to be at work around 6am!  Not much photo opportunities at the fence today but the turkeys were moving like crazy so took the above photo on the way to Rainbow Bay.  My fingers are crossed for lots of marbleds.

The opacum are coming!

It’s about to start!  The opacums are coming.  Around this time of year the marbled salamanders (Ambystoma opacum) are poised to move.  They are out in the woods just waiting for this year’s breeding season.  Unlike most pond-breeding salamanders, marbled sallies move to the “wetland” while it is still dry.  They will mate on rainy nights and females will lay a clutch of eggs and then stay with those eggs until the wetland fills for the season.  Once it fills the eggs will hatch and start their journey toward metamorphosis.  Marbled salamanders aren’t as adept in water as many other species so once the pond starts filling the females will head back to the woods.  It has been hot and dry here all month and only a handful of marbled sals have made their way to Rainbow Bay, but rain is in the forecast!  Probably not tonight, but definitely tomorrow.  That means on Monday morning there could be hundreds or thousands of salamanders in the pitfall traps along the drift fence.  Literally a single 5 gallon bucket can have more than 300 salamanders.  It’s a sight to behold.  It blows my mind each time I see it happen because you can walk all around the woods surrounding the bay and never see a salamander---but they are there---and if you go out on a rainy night in the right time of year you can see a wonderful spectacle.  It will mean some early mornings coming my way but I can’t wait.