Radiotelemetry in Siren lacertina

For those of you that provided contacts and information about implanting transmitters into sirens (particularly Ed Kowalski), I thought you'd like an update on how the research has been going.

I was able to successfully implant the transmitters into 20 Siren lacertina, half in a roadside ditch and half in a natural wetland. I went with 3 gram transmitters and chose animals over 200 grams (total length around 50cm +). A few animals with numerous bite marks (during the breeding season) had problems healing, but for the most part, they healed very quickly.

I've been tracking them now since January, and there's been no mortality in either habitat. Their movements are comparable to what's been reported in the literature - around 10-50 meters, with daily movements usually only a few meters if they've moved at all. As water levels continue to drop, it will be interesting to see when and where the animals choose to aestivate.

I gleaned a lot of helpful husbandy information from this website, and also appreciate the information provided by various people when I was first getting started. As I gather more data, I'll post again in case any of you are interested in what those secretive creatures are doing.

Again, thanks for all the helpful information and I'll keep you posted!

Trisha Crabill

Wonderful, thank you for the summary of your research! I wish you good luck with further tracking, and do keep us posted.

Yes thank you very much for the update..
Once you publish maybe you would consider adding some of the information you learned to the caudata culture site....

Ed

It will likely be atleast a year before anything is published, but I will certainly submit a summary of results and techniques before then.

Trisha

In the February issue of Lab Animal, there's an article about intracoelimic radiotransmitter implantation in Hyla versicolor which may have some application....