LATEST CHANGES: 17 September 2007

Trends in Numbers of Appalachian Salamanders

All salamanders are examined and released within 30 minutes at the site of capture!

Nomenclature follows Petranka 1999.

Great Smoky Mountains National Park
Heintooga Overlook to Spruce Mountain Trail
(elevation 1620-1460 m [5320-4800 feet])

Plethodon jordani

100 * ( salamanders / minute / person searching)
(overall average for collections at four sites
on each of two trips in September each year)
(1998, 1999, and 2002 had exceptionally dry summers)

Coweeta Hydrologic Laboratory
U. S. Forest Service
Ball Creek Road (elevation 780-1050 m [2550-3450 feet])

Plethodon jordani / oconaluftee

100 * (salamanders / minute / person searching)
(overall average of collections at five sites
on each of two trips in September each year)
(1998, 1999, and 2002 had exceptionally dry summers)

Coweeta Hydrologic Laboratory
U. S. Forest Service
Ball Creek Bridge (above the weir, elevation 685 m [2250 feet])

Four species of Desmognathus

D. quadrimaculatus, D. monticola, D. ocoee, D. aeneus

salamanders / person in 1.5 hours of searching
in an area about 150 m square from the creek up the slopes southward
(average of two collections in September each year)

All censuses conducted by students in Vertebrate Field Zoology (BIOL 72L/277L) [ see our web site! ]

Department of Biology, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

Nelson G. Hairston (1976-1988), R. Haven Wiley (1989-2007)

We thank the administration, officers, biologists, and volunteers of Great Smoky Mountains National Park and Coweeta Hydrologic Laboratory for their generous and long-continued cooperation.

. . . Haven Wiley

References for these populations

Hairston, N. G. 1987. Community ecology and salamander guilds. Cambridge University Press.

Hairston, N. G., Sr., R. Haven Wiley, Charles K. Smith, and Ken A. Kneidel. 1992. The dynamics of two hybrid zones in Appalachian salamanders of the genus Plethodon. Evolution 46: 930-938.

Hairston, N. G. 1992. On the validity of the name teyahaleeas applied to a member of the Plethodon glutinosuscomplex (Caudata: Plethodontidae): a new name. Brimleyana 17.

Hairston, N. G., Sr., and R. Haven Wiley. 1993. No decline in salamander (Amphibia: Caudata) populations: a twenty-year study in the southern Appalachians. Brimleyana 18: 59-64.

Dixon, P. M., and J. H. K. Pechmann. 2005. A statistical test to show negligle trend. Ecology 86: 1751-1756.