Salamanders of the United States and Canada

R

rob

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What does everyone think about this book? I'm thinking about getting it but I've heard mix reviews from really useful to filled with errors.
 
You mean Petranka's book? Well, if you want to know about ecology, distribution etc. It is excellent. But if you looking for a information on keeping them it is of course not what you want. For me it is impossible to keep salamanders if I don't know all I can know about their behaviour, ecology, breeding behaviour etc. So if you want to keep American salamanders...
By the way Salamanders of Ohio by Pfingsten (an older book) has also much information on ecology of many species kept by hobbyists.
 
It's an incredibly useful book, not only for the natural history/ecology info it gives, but also for the references it provides. If you want to know about American sals but can't look up the actual scientific papers, then this book is the best there is, period.

The "errors" in it that I hear about most often is the taxonomy, but that is no mistake. Petranka just has differing views about species concepts than some of the other field guide authors (notably Collins). There are some other range map errors but he identifies those in the introduction.

One real error that I found was that the photo of the larval Eurycea multiplicata is definitely not E. multiplicata! But that's it...
 
SOunds like a pretty sound book.

I think I will buy it. WHere does someone go to look up scientific papers on American sals? I've tried going to my University library and such, but I was curious if there was a good site online.
 
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