Amphibian Migration Tonight
Herpers,
it looks like tonight will be a good night to get out on a quiet country road with your flashlight and reflective clothing and see some amphibians. It is fun pandemic-safe activity as long as you stay away from other humans. For those folks outside of the lowlands of the Lake Champlain Basin it may be one of your first opportunities this spring. It would be nice if tonight’s temps were 10 F warmer, but that won’t matter to many species of amphibians.
If you do go out, keep your eyes open for some of the small easily-overlooked species such as Eastern Red-backed and Four-toed Salamanders. They are smaller than night crawlers, about the size of a garden worm, but darker-backed and much harder to see. If you see a very small reddish-brown salamander, pick it up gently. If it is a Four-toed Salamander this will be easy. They are very slow moving. If it is an Eastern Red-backed Salamander they will usually show a burst of energy and wiggle away and will be quite hard to pick up with your fingers. So, if it is easy to pick up, turn it over and look for the shiny white belly with scattered black dots. If you could not pick it up, it was probably an Eastern Red-backed. If you can successfully pick up an E. Red-backed Salamander and turn it over, you will see a cream colored belly background with little gray squiggles all over the belly. It is definitely not bright white with black spots like the Four-toed.
Lots of Spring Peepers should still be moving in the valleys. I will attach the list of towns from which we need Spring Peeper photos. For other photos needed, check our website at:
Don’t forget that we are still in the middle of our fundraiser (see below), so please do forward this message to anyone you think might be interested.
Jim
We are in the middle of our fundraiser. Please visit our GoFundMe site to find out how you can help.
https://www.gofundme.com/f/tvfmw-vermont-reptile-and-amphibian-atlas
