Salamanders

Talk about sightings and get help identifying Plants, Animals, Fish, and Fungi. Share pictures and video.

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Brenda
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They can reach almost 9" in length. Cool sighting.
Finger Lakes Mill Creek Cabins
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Brenda
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I spotted this red eft on the walkway to our cabin after the rain yesterday afternoon. Not great photos--he was less than cooperative. I just wanted to share my sighting.

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Matt
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I just am not lucky finding salamanders. I'm constantly on the lookout, but I rarely do.
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Matt
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A few Salamanders from Fillmore Glen

Northern Two-lined
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northern-two-lined-salamander1.jpg (99.89 KiB) Viewed 4838 times
Red Spotted Newt
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red-spotted-newt2.jpg
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red-spotted-newt3.jpg
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champy1013
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Great shots Matt...

We saw a ton of these up in the Adirondacks this weekend, and interestingly enough we heard the larger red efts calling to each other from under logs. It sounded almost like a frog....anyone else ever seen or heard this?
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Interesting, here's another bit of information on it from an older book, that maybe's a "disturbed" call:
http://books.google.com/books?id=0v47ou ... on&f=false
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and here's another bit of info:
In fact, Robert Stebbins and Nathan Cohen mention several cases of salamander vocalization in their Natural History of Amphibians.

Giant salamanders bark or make rattling noises; ensatinas hiss; red-spotted newts make a “tic-tic-tic” sound. And California newts were described as making “faint, brief sounds” not otherwise described.

So I tracked down the article Stebbins and Cohen cited, by James R. Davis and Bayard H. Brattstrom in the December 1975 issue of the journal Herpetologica. I couldn’t have gotten far with these columns without access to the stacks of UC’s Bioscience and Natural Resources Library. (Thanks, while I’m at it, to the lady who presides over the photocopy room.)

Davis and Brattstrom described how they set up an aquarium for California newts collected in Orange County, monitored their interactions, and recorded their sounds. They identified three kinds of vocalizations, characterized as clicks, squeaks, and whistles.

Their newts clicked when “placed in an unfamiliar location or when confronted by another newt.” The clicks seemed at first to accompany exploratory behavior. Eventually individual newts would claim particular rocks in the tank as their territory and click while defending them against interlopers: “A typical defense sequence would be: intruder tries to climb on a rock occupied by another newt; the resident rises high on its legs, displays the brightly colored throat and chest by raising its head upwards and backward, wags its tail, and clicks; intruder either retreats or presents a similar display with clicks for a short time and then retreats.”

Squeaks were heard only when either Davis or Brattstrom picked up a newt. As for the whistle, a very faint sound (inaudible more than a meter away), it was “produced only when newts were touched in the middle of the back by other newts or by the experimenter…In one instance, after an interruption during amplexus [amphibian sex], a breeding male became disoriented and moved over the back of another newt. The latter elicited a whistle and the breeding male moved away.” It sounds like the whistle might be translated as “Hey! Get off me!”

That’s the story, then. You’ll never hear a deafening chorus of newts, but they do have things to say to each other. If curious, you might visit the Japanese pond at the UC Botanical Garden and listen closely for clicks and whistles.


The tic-tic-tic was what we were hearing from two of the newts under one log...maybe also they call to say "Hey this place is mine!"

http://www.berkeleydailyplanet.com/issu ... -Joe-Eaton
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Matt
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very interesting! I had no idea. I didn't even consider it when authoring the Salamander guide. I'll have to revisit that page, if not to just make a note that there may be some noises.
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