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.