New Hampshire Nature Notes
by Eric Orff

Spotted salamanders on the move Saturday night and the Suncook River is at flood stage.

Monday 04/04/2005

So much has happened since Friday. The heavy rains since Saturday afternoon has nearly wiped out the remaining snow locally. Hooray. It has also caused many rivers in the state to fill and spill into the surrounding flood plains. And so it is here in Epsom, as I look out at the Suncook River this morning. The 10 acre corn field below, in what I call the meadow, is half covered with water.

The rains Saturday night also triggered the beginning of the annual spotted salamander migration to their breeding places. It seems a bit early because, as of Saturday, the floor of the woodlands was still pretty well snow covered. I really expected the major migration on the next night time rain event after Saturday night's rain melted the snow. Probably Thursday night 4/7.

But, as I came home Saturday night at 11:30 from the NH Wildlife Federation banquet I told my wife that there might be a few salamanders moving. As I turned down my road I said " If there are any moving? One will be right by the little brook". Sure enough just as I got the words out of my mouth one was sliding across the road.

I dropped her off and turned right around to do my first "salamander census" of the year. As I backed my truck out of the garage at 11:40 a salamander greeted me right in my driveway. It appeared to be a big gravid female! I crept up the road then up New Rye Hill and out Swamp Road to where I turn around at Mountain View Road. I did meet two vehicles at this late hour, a car on New Rye and a pickup on Swamp Road. Miracles of miracles neither of these vehicles had run over a salamander based on my checking.

I did stop and watch one salamander cross the end of my road as I timed it. They seemed to be moving right along Saturday night due to the warm rain. In fact this one crossed the road in just over a minute. On cooler nights it may take them 10 or more minutes. My total count was nine salamanders with no mortality. I was surprised by this many moving so early with so much snow left in the woods and all the vernal ponds locally with an ice cover yet. I was back home by 12:10AM.

Generally I won't see them crossing until the rain after I hear peepers here. But no peepers here yet and I only saw one frog moving Saturday night, a wood frog.I think they moved all night Saturday night as the skies opened up around 2:00 Am for a while. Sunday night's rain may also have moved some, although the roads were pretty dry around 9;00 PM when I came home from Concord. It did start to rain after midnight again. I so love to hear it rain after midnight, and not before, this time of year. Its just a matter of luck. By not raining until the middle of the night, more salamanders will make the transit without being killed by cars.

Three year ago the rain came on a Wednesday at evening commute time. I had 17 crushed salamanders in my 3-mile route. Only 5 live, as I recall. I estimated that over 12,000 salamanders were killed that night on secondary roads in Rockingham and Merrimack Counties at the commute time. It was such a slaughter that night.

I'm still thinking that the next warm rainy night will be the "Big Night" for salamanders here. Looks right now like that will be Thursday night. So get that gallon of milk on the way home from work and avoid driving after dark if you can these next few weeks. Help save our beautiful silent spotted salamanders! If you must drive after dark and it is raining, slooooooooow down. I mean way down, 10 to 15 mph. The salamanders can easily be spotted as they are usually moving. Frogs too. Except peepers are so small and they tend to "hunker down" when the headlight shine on them. But they too can be spotted and avoided. Simply drive around or straddle any item on the road.