H-02 wetland metamorphs

Quite a while back I did a several post series on the ecotoxicology studies we are doing at the H-02 wetlands (starting Jan 24, 2011).  Those continue and are mostly focused on some lab and mesocosm studies of southern toads right now (more on that next week), but we continue to do some field work in the wetlands.  part of the goal is to keep track of which species have been able to not only colonize the wetlands, but successfully reproduce in them.  The way our drift fence is set up we can't tell which wetland cell the metamorphs come from, but at least we know there is somewhere in the wetlands where they can make it.  The last couple of weeks we are getting a good number of metamorphs for green frogs, bullfrogs, and southern leopard frogs.  The fact that those three species are doing well there is somewhat surprising since they have a very long larval period and have to spend all of that time in the contaminated water.  Hopefully we can start determining if they are only making it in the effluent ends (where the copper, zinc and pH are lower) of the treatment cells.  we do catch a lot more of them in minnow traps put at those ends.  One of the most frustrating research we've tried is rearing amphibians from the freshly hatched stage to metamorphosis in some bucket style cages in the wetlands.  Goal is to  compare success in the retention pond, the influent end and effluent ends of the treatment cells.  sounds easy enough but between storms and vertebrate predators flipping buckets and invertebrate predators getting in the buckets no matter how hard we try to  keep them out it has been ridiculously hard.  Gonna try again this fall with some new designs.  Never thought the gene expression work would be easier than rearing amphibians in buckets.  crazy stuff.  Anyway, we at least know these three ranids are reproducing in there.  In the photo you've got recent metamorphs of a bullfrog on top, southern leopard frog on right and green frog on left.  Last week had probably a 100 or so combined coming out of the wetland.

A lizard time of year

To those of you that follow this I am sorry for taking such a long hiatus.  I am hoping to get back in the swing of things and will plan on posting once a week.  Right now most of the drift fences are pretty quiet--no rain and temps in the 90's--not a great combination for amphibians.  But, this time of year we do get to see a lot of lizards.  We've had more Sceloporus than usual showing up in the pit fall traps, a handful of ground skinks, and plenty of Anolis in the buckets but also scurrying all over the fence.  This Thursday and Friday I actually had the pleasure of going out looking for lizards.  Normally I see a few opportunistically, but rarely do I go looking for them.  But, Bryan Falk, a graduate student at AMNH working with Susan Perkins (who I went to grad school with) was in town looking for Anolis and Sceloporus so I got to help him.  He is studying lizard malaria and was looking for some infected animals.  It was nice change of pace for me.  We didn't get any Sceloporus but got a good number of Anolis and saw plenty of skinks....like the broadhead skink, Eumeces laticeps, in the photo.

Other drift fence highlights this week include three ringneck snakes (as in photo) in one bucket--not surprisingly one female and two males that most likely were following the scent of the female and got stuck in the same bucket.  Also got one copperhead juvenile distinguished by it's yellow tail tip. 

Flamingo Bay critters continued

It's been some time since my grand visit to Flamingo Bay but in addition to the southern leopard frog eggs, and the sea of toads we came across two nice cottonmouths within a short distance.  This is a gorgeous snake that gets a really bad rap.  I admit I have had "snake issues" in the past.  Working in the rainforest in Panama helped but I still wasn't exactly cured.  Before I moved to SC from New England everyone warned me about the aggressive cottonmouths that were everywhere and would attack for no reason.  I wasn't exactly feeling confident when I first was doing field work here.  What I quickly learned is that, like many wildlife stories, it was way off base.  That they are quite common here is certainly true, that you can expect them to be aggressive and attack you is utterly ridiculous.  Take these two snakes for instance.  The one with the tell-tale open mouth posture (the cotton mouth) sat like that for about 5 min or more while several of us took photos and video.  That's my experience so far with all of them (as long as you're not stepping on them or some such thing).  We get them in our box traps and pit fall traps and they give you the open mouth posture, you move them out of the trap in a safe manner, and they go about their business.  Hate to admit with this one we even moved it into better light for the sake of the videographer we had with us and it still did nothing aggressive. Just sat there and posed for the camera.  The second one was pretty much the same, it finally closed its mouth so I could get a head shot.  I've come a long way with my "snake issues."  I even have a pet snake (thanks to a grad student that couldn't have it in his apartment) that I took to help with my issues.  But one thing I am absolutely convinced of is that cottonouths are gorgeous animals that have a really bad rep.