Sunny day at E.E. Wilson

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Hadar
Posts: 251
Joined: October 12th, 2011, 6:39 pm
Location: Delray Beach, Florida
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Sunny day at E.E. Wilson

Post by Hadar »

UPDATED POST

I'm trying to get better at using FHF and HERP to add records instead of just sharing my adventures with my friends on FB or Google+ so here goes my first post complete with HERP records and image links from those records...

Yesterday was one of those rare sunny days that occur during the Oregon winter. It was dry, with a low of 42F and a high of 62F. I went to E.E. Wilson with two of my friends (not herpers) and their dog. We went to the tin spot to see if anything was out. One of my friends had to hold the dog back on his leash so he wouldn't try to eat the rodents that scurried out from under the boards. Under the third tin I found a Ambystoma macrodactylum macrodactylum, thank you Richard and Jonathan for the ID.
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After searching the first two rows of tin we decided to skip the middle section due to my friends and their dog getting attacked by blackberry bushes. My friend let the dog off the leash so he could get through the thorns better and the dog immediately ran to a crumbling foundation. There we found him staring at a dead mouse and at least four Thamnophis scattered away. Two of them were too fast for me to photograph because I was on the other side of the blackberries. The other two I have attached photos of. They look like Thamnophis sirtalis concinnus to me.

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There were Pseudacris regilla everywhere, at the pools around the parking lot, in the standing water in the ditches, at the wetlands, etc. I only photographed two of them and was unable to get an accurate count. Does anyone have suggestions of how to count these guys by call? I almost recorded their calls to share but I didn't know if that is something we can do here.

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Overall it was a pretty mellow day but any day you can get in the field is a good one in my book and I got two more people hooked on herping.

Cheers, Heather
Richard F. Hoyer
Posts: 639
Joined: June 7th, 2010, 1:14 pm

Re: Sunny day at E.E. Wilson

Post by Richard F. Hoyer »

Hadar:
The artificial cover objects at E. E. Wilson were set up in the early 1980's when I initiated a study of the Rubber Boa at the wildlife area. With another gentleman, those cover objects also were used in a pilot study of the Gopher Snakes at E. E. Wilson.

However, being a multiple use wildlife area, both studies yielded scant information as there occurred so much disturbance of both the cover objects and the boas in particular. I have left the cover objects at the various areas I has set up as over the years, a fair number of individuals have taken advantage of observing herps much as you have done.

Unfortunately, a commercial collector also has been working the cover objects in recent years so the densities of some species of snakes have suffered.

Nice find for the month of January. The salamanders are the Long-toed Salamander. That are one of the main prey for the Ringneck Snake on E. E. Wilson which are likely to be the most numerically abundant snake on the wildlife area.

Richard F. Hoyer (Corvallis)
Richard F. Hoyer
Posts: 639
Joined: June 7th, 2010, 1:14 pm

Re: Sunny day at E.E. Wilson

Post by Richard F. Hoyer »

At around 2 PM this afternoon, the fog had burnt off in N. Corvallis and the temperature had risen in to the low 50's. I had attended a bird symposium on Saturday so missed out on the suitable conditions for making searches that day. So despite marginal conditions, this afternoon I decided to head out to some of my boa sites west and north.

But when I got south of the OSU campus on 35th and all the way west into Philomath, it was foggy and 48 degrees. However, up Hwy. 20 west to Wren, the sun was out and the air temperature was 53 degrees. I stopped at three of my sites an came up with two male Rubber Boas at one site and one male boa at another site.

Then on to Airlie and my former Common Sharp-tailed Study site. But the region north in southern Polk Co. was fogged in and the temperature was 46 degrees. Despite those unsuitable conditions, I made some searches and came up with a juvenile S. All. Lizards for my troubles. So my field season is getting off to a bit earlier start than normal in 2015.

Richard F. Hoyer (Corvallis)
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jonathan
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Re: Sunny day at E.E. Wilson

Post by jonathan »

Nice post Heather. I like finding snakes and salamanders on the same day. And you found two of the prettier species too. The chorus frogs are nice-looking too.

Like Richard said, this time around you got a Western Long-toed Salamander. A couple clues - look at the toe length on those back feet, and also note that the green back coloration doesn't spread down the legs like it did on that Dunn's salamander you found.

Another short-cut key I use most often (but which has thrown me off once or twice) is habitat. Dunn's will usually be found associated with streams or talus, especially under rocks. Long-toed Salamanders will usually be found associated with marshy wetlands, especially under boards or logs. I have found two sites that had both species in association though (when there was talus leading down into a wetland), and that caused me to misidentify some of them until I later looked at the photos closer.

The Red-spotted Garter ID is certainly correct. Pretty one, as most of them are.

With frog calls, I just count the absolute minimum that I'm sure I can hear...usually 2 or 3 or 5. Over five gets hard to count. You can record the call via video with your camera (or audio with your phone if it does that), and then convert the file to audio and upload it to NAHERP as a record.

Great job entering the finds into NAHERP - we could use a lot, lot more Northwest data. If you right click on the photos and hit "copy image URL", then paste that into your post with image tags (see the "Img" button), you can put the photos directly into your post from NAHERP, like I did for you below.

Hadar wrote:I'm trying to get better at using FHF and HERP to add records instead of just sharing my adventures with my friends on FB or Google+ so here goes my first post complete with HERP records and image links from those records...

Yesterday was one of those rare sunny days that occur during the Oregon winter. It was dry, with a low of 42F and a high of 62F. I went to E.E. Wilson with two of my friends (not herpers) and their dog. We went to the tin spot to see if anything was out. One of my friends had to hold the dog back on his leash so he wouldn't try to eat the rodents that scurried out from under the boards. Under the third tin I found a yellow striped salamander, I believe Plethodon dunni, but for those from the area maybe you can confirm or deny this from the photo.

Image

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After searching the first two rows of tin we decided to skip the middle section due to my friends and their dog getting attacked by blackberry bushes. My friend let the dog off the leash so he could get through the thorns better and the dog immediately ran to a crumbling foundation. There we found him staring at a dead mouse and at least four Thamnophis scattered away. Two of them were too fast for me to photograph because I was on the other side of the blackberries. The other two I have attached photos of. They look like Thamnophis sirtalis concinnus to me.

Image

Image

Image

Image

Image

There were Pseudacris regilla everywhere, at the pools around the parking lot, in the standing water in the ditches, at the wetlands, etc. I only photographed two of them and was unable to get an accurate count. Does anyone have suggestions of how to count these guys by call? I almost recorded their calls to share but I didn't know if that is something we can do here.

Image

Image

Image

Overall it was a pretty mellow day but any day you can get in the field is a good one in my book and I got two more people hooked on herping.

Cheers, Heather
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Hadar
Posts: 251
Joined: October 12th, 2011, 6:39 pm
Location: Delray Beach, Florida
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Re: Sunny day at E.E. Wilson

Post by Hadar »

Thank you Jonathan and Richard for your help. I have made edits and look forward to getting better at posting. :)
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