Monday, January 25, 2010

Everybody needs to check out House of Herps #2, another fun round of herp blog posts. I submitted the recent post about not finding redback salamanders (Plethodon cinereus).

A quick note - Scott and I finally, FINALLY, FINALLY found tiger salamanders (Ambystoma tigrinum) on the fourth year of trying! As soon as Scott gets me the photos from his camera ("You might need to charge the battery on the camera," Jen said. Did I listen?) , I'll do the post.

2 comments:

ramblingwoods said...

Thank you for the information on snappers. I have always wondered how the baby snappers know which way to head for water. The female always lays her eggs across the street near the woods edge (freaking people out when they see her in their yard. I find baby snappers have crossed the street and are heading toward the pond as I see them. Is this just luck on their part?...Michelle

Bernard Brown said...

Overall those little guys are heading for the water, though maybe indirectly. I've been reading more about how baby water turtles get back to the water, and it's apparently not as straightforward as you might think (or as I thought), sometimes with more wandering and hanging out on land than heading straight for the water's edge.

Also note that lots of female turtles dig multiple test holes before they lay, so she might end up laying on the pond side of the street some of the time too.