The Amphibian Foundation's Frog Blog

We had another successful October field trip to Constitution Lakes (Dekalb County, GA), this time with the Master Herpetologist students. Constitution Lakes is a fantastic urban site for an autumn field survey. Future Master Herpetologists, Anthony, and myself shared pictures for this article. #DipnetSelfie We found many adult Marbled Salamanders, but not as many nests as last year. Perhaps we haven't had enough rain yet in Atlanta to trigger a full migration. Most of the Fall 2019 Master Herpetologist group — geared up and ready for amphibian surveys. Alan had the distinction of finding the first Marbled Salamander of the survey. Marbled Salamanders ( Ambystoma opacum ) are a common species throughout most of their range, but not in Atlanta, where they were undoubtedly once common. Now, our community science surveys have only detected one population of the species in metro Atlanta, and that is at Constitution Lakes. For more information on Marbled Salamanders...

The Agnes Scott Biology of Amphibians continuing education class had an incredible field outing yesterday when we joined Metro Atlanta Amphibian Monitoring Program (MAAMP) community scientist Kate Carson at a new field site in the hopes of detecting Marbled Salamanders ( Ambystoma opacum ). Jeff, Rob, Kate, Anna, Christian and Anthony on our urban expedition to find Marbled Salamanders. Earlier in the year, The Nature Conservancy inadvertently unearthed a Marbled Salamander while removing invasive plants from the park. They reached out to us at the Amphibian Foundation and we were able to confirm this was only the second confirmed sighting of the species since the MAAMP began in 2014. Marbled Salamanders are considered 'common' throughout most if its range, but have suffered significant declines in developed and urban regions, probably due to loss of their breeding and upland habitats. Ephemeral (temporary) wetland breeding amphibians only use the wetland for a few w...

State Herpetologist, John Jensen took me out months ago to collect conservation breeding stock of Marbled Salamanders, Ambystoma opacum . Last autumn, John Jensen who is one of the state herpetologists for GA Department of Natural Resources, and also on the Scientific Advisory Board for the Amphibian Foundation, took me out into the field in the hopes of collecting Marbled Salamanders for inclusion in our conservation breeding program. This program, of which the ultimate goal is to successfully propagate healthy Frosted Flatwoods Salamanders ( Ambystoma cingulatum ) for release into restored habitat in the southeast, also focuses on surrogate species. Ambystomatid salamanders, such as the Marbled and Flatwoods species, have not been reliably bred in captivity, and gaining a better understanding on how this can be accomplished is vital to the program's success. Marbled Salamanders and Flatwoods Salamanders are unique in one interesting way — they breed exclusively in dry eph...

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 I haven't had much time for illustration these days, but I felt inspired by the time of year and all the autumnal migrations happening right now in the salamander world, so I made some time for this one. Fall breeding salamanders are among my favorites. Marbled salamanders breed this time of year and the female lays her eggs in a dry Ephemeral pond basin. She then waits for the autumnal rains to fill the pond and inundate the eggs with water. She must leave the eggs then because Marbled Salamanders are poor swimmers and run the risk of drowning. I enjoy illustrating in Photoshop and it has helped me experiment with color - my line drawings by hand are always simply pen and ink. #ScientificIllustration #Illustration #Photoshop #MarbledSalamander #Ambystomatidae #Ambystomaopacum #Ambystoma

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Marbled salamander | Ambystoma opacum