Salamander Project Update

These things rarely turn out as I plan. Or maybe I just don't plan them well. Either way, my little projects tend to take rather curious twists or turns, and the Salamander Rearing Project: 2008 Edition was no exception. Some of you may want to read my original post on the subject, for the rest of you, I'll simply state that I collected several Ambystoma larvae from a vernal pool in my home county, and brought them home to rear them to . . . well, some point past metamorphoses anyway. My goal was to verify the continued presence of the Marbled Salamander there.

Unanticipated Problem #1: Feeding 7 larvae 10 (give or take) freeze-dried bloodworms by handheld forceps every day got old very quickly-- I had to dangle each individual worm tantalizingly in front of each little larval snout until the little guy sucked it in-- and the colony underwent, er, selective reduction after about a week. I kept the three largest and most interesting looking to see what they turn out to be.

Unanticipated Problem #2: The larvae grew a bit faster than I had calculated and were showing obvious signs of imminent metamorphosis (including gill shrinkage and tail ridge loss) shortly before I was to leave town for Myrtle Beach for a week. I ended up solving this by placing the three remaining larvae in one little water-filled sandwich container (sans lid) and placing this inside a larger plastic shoe box lined with mud and leaves. After placing a tree bark bridge from the smaller container to the floor of the larger (so each metamorph could leave the "pond" when it was ready) I put on the lid and placed it at the shadiest portion of the base of my lilac bush hoping for the best.

Fast-forward one week. We return from Myrtle Beach late, late at night. No time to check the 'manders. Next day, we went out and found the shoe box and shade had done the job as expected. Plenty of moisture had been retained and two, count them, TWO of the larvae had metamorphosized.
This was the first one to go, I believe, judging from the progress of gill resorbtion. The tape measure above is metric by the way, so the little guy was about 40 mm in total length. This is under the average length most Ambystoma larvae undergo metamorphosis, and was probably the result of the limited diet of captivity. Here is a picture of the same animal in a more natural setting.
You can kind of see the faintest remnant of the gills. Anyway, back to the story.

I took the whole contraption back to the basement to set up a juvenile habitat. While I was working all that out, the final larva "went terrestrial". I put them all in the new hab, and started looking for possible prey items to supply to them.

I ended up settling on what is either a small species of earthworm or juvenile regular earthworms. Whatever the case they looked just the right size and I supplied them to the two remaining salamanders. Yes, two. At some point one disappeared. I don't want to believe that the other two got all "Timothy" on him, but there are only so many plausible scenarios here.

I guess the salamanders agreed with my assesment of prey suitability.

By the way, it does not appear to me that either of these animals are the Marbled Salamander I was hoping for. The first one looks like a hybrid of a Blue-spotted Salamander and . . . something. The other looks like it has Jefferson's salamander genes in it. Discerning lineage in hybrids is always difficult, but as they grow it should be at least a little easier.

Anyway, now you are as up to date as I am. As always, all earth-shattering developments will be shared in . . . almost real time.