South Fork Natural History Museum Salamander Tracking Project - 5/25

Описание: 🦎 Introduction to Eastern Tiger Salamanders & Radio Telemetry
Jake Kushner, the reptile and amphibian specialist at SOFO, introduces the Eastern Tiger Salamander tracking project using radio telemetry. He outlines the goals of understanding their movement and habitat use to inform conservation strategies.

🧪 Ecological Importance & Project Goals
The Long Pond Greenbelt, a biodiverse and ecologically significant region, is home to the endangered Eastern Tiger Salamander. The project seeks to understand where salamanders travel post-breeding, especially around vernal pools.

🧭 Vernal Pools and Habitat Specifics
Vernal pools are seasonal, fishless wetlands crucial for salamander breeding. These pools fill with rain and snowmelt and are critical for several amphibians and invertebrates.

🕳️ Salamander Behavior and Traits
These fossorial creatures spend 97% of their lives underground. They are large terrestrial salamanders with specific moisture needs, which they meet by staying in burrows most of the time.

🧬 Tracking Methods and Equipment
The project utilizes surgical implantation of mini radio transmitters inside salamanders. These are tracked using a radio receiver and directional Yagi antenna. Signals help locate individual salamanders with great precision.

🩺 Surgical and Ethical Procedures
Tags weigh less than 5% of the salamander's body weight. Animals are anesthetized, tagged surgically, and observed post-op to ensure recovery. Antibiotics and pain relief are administered to minimize stress and harm.

📡 Data Collection and Movement Analysis
Salamanders are tracked twice weekly with GPS to map movement. Results already suggest they move beyond current conservation buffer zones and utilize a variety of habitats, not just forests.

🌱 Diverse Habitat Usage Documented
Contrary to expectations, tagged salamanders were found in forests, pine stands, and open fields, debunking previous assumptions that only forest habitats were used. This supports broader conservation protections.

🌧️ Rain and Movement Patterns
Salamanders tend to move after significant rainfall, essential due to their moisture needs. Home ranges were small—usually a few square meters—but movement varied by season and weather.

⏳ Lifespan, Challenges, and Future Technology
These salamanders can live up to 30 years. One project limitation is battery life of the transmitter. Improvements in tracking tech are expected in future. Only males were tagged to avoid disturbing egg-laying females.

📊 Insights Based on Numbers
97% underground lifestyle emphasizes the necessity for specialized tracking like radio telemetry to understand salamander behavior.

535 ft and 1,000 ft buffer zones used for protection are insufficient; some salamanders were tracked well beyond those distances.

0.9g transmitters implanted to minimize burden illustrate the careful balance between data collection and animal welfare.

20 salamanders tagged across multiple pools reflect a robust sampling effort over multiple years.