Moving a planter from atop a rotting stump revealed a California Slender Salamander
With chytrid fungus infections causing large-scale mortality in many amphibian populations, could the California Slender Salamander (Batrachoseps attenuatus) be at risk? Rolling back downed wood and closely examining the ground beneath often reveals these salamanders coiled and motionless. (Careful replacement of the wood is essential in preserving the ecological communities that are uncovered.)
Inhabitants of chaparral, oak woodlands, and forests, as well as backyards and lots with leaf litter and cover objects, California Slender Salamanders are found throughout the San Francisco Bay Area as far south as Monterey Bay, north along the coast into Southern Oregon, as well as in scattered locations inland. Despite the current range and density of these salamanders, could a chytrid fungus outbreak substantially lower populations, or has this species developed a way of coping with a deleterious infectious organism?
Sara Weinstein, currently a PhD student in the Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Marine Biology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, studied chytrid fungus infection of the California Slender Salamander for her undergraduate honors thesis at the University of California, Berkeley. The work was published in the journal Copeia in 2009.
Through examination of preserved specimens collected earlier, Weinstein determined that amphibian chytrid fungus, Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis, had infected the California Slender Salamander since at least 1973. (Previous to her study, the earliest evidence for amphibian chytrid infection in California was a mountain yellow-legged frog collected in 1975.)
In the case of the California Slender Salamander, amphibian numbers seem stable despite clear evidence of sporadic chytrid disease outbreaks. Chytrid-related mortality of these salamanders occurs mainly during the latter part of the wet season and the months immediately following, from approximately February through May. In contrast, during dry summer conditions that limit fungal growth, it appears that California Slender Salamanders are able to rid themselves of infection through excessive skin shedding and tail loss, essentially removing the parasite faster than it can reproduce.-Anne M. Rosenthal
Stebbins, Robert C. 2003. A Field Guide to Western Reptiles and Amphibians, Third Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston.
Weinstein, Sara B. 2009. An aquatic disease on a terrestrial salamander: individual and population level effects of the amphibian chytrid fungus, Batrachochytrium dendrobatis, on Batrachoseps attenuatus (Plethodontidae). Copeia No. 4: 653-660.
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