Acta Herpetologica 8(1)

Italian Herpetological Society

Acta Herpetologica 8(1)
Contents:
Canessa, Stefano, An Martel and Frank Pasmans. 2013. No detection of chytrid in first systematic screening of Bombina variegata pachypus (Anura: Bombinatoridae) in Liguria, northern Italy. Acta Herpetologica. 8 (1): 59-63. [ canessas@unimelb.edu.au]
Castiglia, Riccardo, Alexandra Maria Ramos Bezerra, Oscar Flores-Villela, Flavia Annesi, Antonio Muñoz and Ekaterina Gornung. 2013. Comparative cytogentics of two species of ground skinks: Scincella assata and S. cherriei (Squamata: Scincidae: Lygosominae) from Chiapas, Mexico. Acta Herpetologica. 8 (1): 69-73. [ castiglia@uniroma1.it]
Delaugerre, Michel-Jean. 2013. Going out tonight? When insular Hierophis viridiflavus breaks the Whip Snakes rules. Acta Herpetologica. 8 (1): 47-52. [ m.delauggere@conservatoire-du-littoral.fr]
Gutierrez, Joel Antu, Carla Piantoni and Nora R. Ibargüengoytía. 2013. Altitudinal effects on life history parameters in populations of Liolaemus pictus argentinus (Sauria: Liolaemidae). Acta Herpetologica. 8 (1): 9-17. [ carla.piantoni@gmail.com]
Gvozdik, Vaclav, Veronika Javurkova and Oldrich Kopecky. 2013. First evidence of a paedomorphic population of the smooth newt (Lissotriton vulgaris) in the Czech Republic. Acta Herpetologica. 8 (1): 53-57. [ kopeckyo@af.czu.cz]
Hojati, Vida, Kazem Parivar, Eskandar Rastegar-Pouyani and Abdolhossein Shiravi. 2013. The oogenic cycle of the Caspian Bent-toed Gecko, Cyrtopodion caspium (Squamata: Gekkonidae) in Iran. Acta Herpetologica. 8 (1): 1-8. [ vida.hojati@gmail.com]
Kaliontzopoulou, Antigoni, Daniele Salvi, Veronica Gomes, João P. M. C. Maia and Panagiotis Kaliontzopoulos. 2013. Polydactyly in the Tyrrhenian Wall Lizard (Podarcis tiliguerta). Acta Herpetologica. 8 (1): 75-78. [ antigoni@cibio.up.pt]
Kleewein, Andreas and Günther Wöss. 2013. Status of the European Pond Turtle, Emys orbicularis (Reptilia: Testudines: Emydidae) in Vorarlberg, Austria. Acta Herpetologica. 8 (1): 65-67. [ andreas.kleewein@gmx.net]
Nakamura, Yasuyuki, Akio Takahashi and Hidetoshi OTA. 2013. Recent cryptic extinction of squamate reptiles on Yoronjima Island of the Ryukyu Archipelago, Japan, inferred from garbage dump remains. Acta Herpetologica. 8 (1): 19-34. [ ynaka.riukiaria@gmail.com]
Razzetti, Edoardo. 2013. Book review: Roberto Sindaco, Altero Venchi, Cristina Grieco. The Reptiles of the Western Palearctic. 2. Annotated checklist and distributional atlas of the snakes of Europe, North Africa, Middle East and Central Asia, with an update to the Vol. 1. Acta Herpetologica. 8 (1): 79-80. [ razzetti@unipv.it]
Sukalo, Goran, Sonia Dordevic, Dragojla Golub, Dejan Dmitrovic and Ljiljana Tomovic. 2013. Novel, non-invasive method for distinguishing the individuals of the Fire Salamander (Salamandra salamandra) in capture-mark-recapture studies. Acta Herpetologica. 8 (1): 41-45. [ sukalogoran@yahoo.com]
Zuffi, Marca A. L. and Chiara Giannelli. 2013. Trophic niche and feeding biology of the Italian Wall Lizard, Podarcis siculus campestris (De Betta, 1857) along western Mediterranean coast. Acta Herpetologica. 8 (1): 35-39. [ marcoz@museo.unipi.it]

Table of Contents of Amphibian & Reptile Conservation 7(1) - Special Mexico Issue

Provided by Herpdigest and ZenScienst.com

 Note: All of these articles are open access and available for download at ZenScientist.com

Contents:

Wilson LD. 2013. Preface Amphibian & Reptile Conservation 7(1): i–ii.

Johnson JD, Porras LW, Schuett GW, Mata-Silva V, Wilson LD. 2013. Dedications. Amphibian & Reptile Conservation 7(1): iii–vi.

Wilson LD, Mata-Silva V, Johnson JD. 2013. A conservation reassessment of the reptiles of Mexico based on the EVS measure. Amphibian & Reptile Conservation 7(1): 1–47 (e61).

Porras LW, Wilson LD, Schuett GW, Reiserer RS. 2013. A taxonomic reevaluation and conservation assessment of the common cantil,Agkistrodon bilineatus (Squamata: Viperidae): a race against time. Amphibian & Reptile Conservation 7(1): 48–73 (e63).

Reiserer RS, Schuett GW, Beck DD. 2013. Taxonomic reassessment and conservation status of the beaded lizard, Heloderma horridum (Squamata: Helodermatidae). Amphibian & Reptile Conservation 7(1): 74–96 (e67).

Wilson LD, Johnson JD, Mata-Silva V. 2013. A conservation reassessment of the amphibians of Mexico based on the EVS measure. Amphibian& Reptile Conservation 7(1): 97–127(e69).

Alvarado-Díaz J, Suazo-Ortuño I, Wilson LD, Medina-Aguilar O. 2013. Patterns of physiographic distribution and conservation status of the herpetofauna of Michoacán, Mexico. Amphibian & Reptile Conservation 7(1): 128–170(e71).

Also All previous issues of this journal have also been added to ZenScientist.com:

http://www.zenscientist.com/index.php/filedrawer/Open-Access-Journals/Amphibian--and--Reptile-Conservation/

Herpetological Review 44(3)

Herpetological Review 44(3) Contents:

Acosta-Chaves, Víctor and Jose Andrés Salazar Zuñinga. 2013. Diploglossus monotropis (Costa Rican rainbow striped galliwasp) predation. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 508. [victor.acosta@ucr.ac.cr]

Ahumada-Carrillo, Iván T. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Lepidophyma gaigeae (Gaige's tropical night lizard). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 475.

Angeli, Nicole Frances, Kathryn Auer, Nathan Schwartz, Zeth Westfall, Clayton Pollock, Ian Lundgren and Zandy Hillis-Starr. 2013. Ameiva polops (St. Croix ground lizard) behavior. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 504. [ nangeli@tamu.edu]

Araujo, Samia Caroline Melo, Geandre Dl Lira Sousa and Etielle Barroso De Andrade. 2013. Philodryas nattereri (Paraguay green racer) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 526. [samia_caroline@hotmail.com]

Arbuckle, Kevin. 2013. Folklore husbandry and a philosophical model for the design of captive management regimes. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 448-452. [k.arbuckle@msn.com]

Arcos, Victor Hugo Jimenez, Anibal H. Díaz De La Vega Pérez, Eric Centenero Alcala and Fausto R. Méndez de la Cruz. 2013. Sceloporus aeneus (bunchgrass spiny lizard) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 513. [ vhjimenezarcos@yahoo.com.mx]

Arenas-Monroy, José C. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Sceloporus dugesii (Duges' spiny lizard). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 475.

Arenas-Monroy, José C. and Christian Martin García-Balderas. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Eleutherodactylus guttilatus (spotted chirping frog). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 472.

Aubret, Fabien, Mélodie Tort and Gaélle Blanvillain. 2013. A non-invasive method of measuring heart rates in small reptiles and amphibians. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 421-423. [ faubret@gmail.com]

Augustine, Lauren, Valorie Titus and C. Drew Foster. 2013. Color recognition as a management tool with a female Nile crocodile (Crocodylus niloticus) at the Wildlife Conservation Society's Bronx Zoo. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 445-447. [ vtitus@wcs.org]

Austin, Gant D. and Thomas A. Sinclair. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Ramphotyphlops braminus (Brahminy blindsnake). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 477.

Babb, Randall D. and Thomas C. Brennan. 2013. Aspidoscelis tigris (tiger whiptail) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 507. [ rbabb@azgfd.gov]

Babb, Randall D. and Thomas C. Brennan. 2013. Colenyx variegatus (western banded gecko) and Rena humilis (western threadsnake) attempted predation. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 507-508. [ rbabb@azgfd.gov]

Backlin, Adam R. and Katerine L. Baumberger. 2013. Rana draytonii (California red-legged frog) unusual death. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 499. [ abacklin@usgs.gov]

Baldvins, Thomas D., Charles M. Oliver, Jennifer M. Howze and Lori L. Smith. 2013. Crotalus horridus (timber rattlesnake) reproduction. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 520. [tom.baldvins@vikings.berry.edu]

Bauer, Aaron M. 2013. Book Review: Australian lizards-a natural history. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 530-531. [ aaron.bauer@villnova.edu]

Baxter-Gilbert, James, Julia L. Riley and Jacqueline D. Litzgus. 2013. Sistrurus catenatus catenatus (eastern massasauga) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 526-527. [jx_baxtergilbert@laurentian.ca]

Beane, Jeffrey C. 2013. New geographic distribution records for reptiles from North Carolina, USA. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 478-481. [ jeff.beane@naturalsciences.org]

Beane, Jeffrey C. and L. Todd Pusser. 2013. Siren lacertina (greater siren) predation. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 492. [ jeff.beane@naturalsciences.org]

Belknap, Katherine. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Ambystoma maculatum (spotted salamander). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 470.

Bernstein, William L. and Reese W. Bernstein. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Hemidactylus turcicus (Mediterranean gecko). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 474.

Blanco-Torres, Argelina, Kathy Navarro-Gutiérrez and Luis Carlos Gutiérrez Moreno. 2013. Colostethus inguinalis (common rocket frog) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 493-494. [ argelinab@gmail.com]

Boon-Hee, Kueh, Chong Kar Wei, Janice Hiew May Lin, Mohd, Nazef Bin Abdul Majid and Danny Chew Tee Wah. 2013. Limnonectes palavanensis (smooth guardian frog) ocular anomaly. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 496-497. [ kbhkelvin@hotmail.com]

Boundy, Jeff. 2013. Book Review: Amphibians and Reptiles of the Carolinas and Virginia, 2nd edition. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 528-529. [ jboundy@wlf.la.gov]

Braun, Michael J., Charles J. Cole, Llewellyn D. Densmore and George C. Gorman. 2013. Obituaries: Celebrating Herbert Clay Dessauer 1921-2013. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 356-361. [ cole@amnh.org]

Briggler, Jeffrey T., Brian L. McKeage, Nicholas M. Girondo and Phillip R. Pitts. 2013. Evaluation of traps to capture eastern hellbenders (Cryptobranchus alleganiensis) in deep water habitat. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 423-428. [ jeff.briggler@mdc.mo.gov]

Brown, Jennifer and Jacob Kerby. 2013. Batrochytrium dendrobatidis in South Dakota, USA amphibians. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 457-458. [ jacob.kerby@usd.edu]

Carbajal-Márquez, Rubén A., José C. Arenas-Monroy, Christoph I. Grünwald and Jason M. Jones. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Eleutherodactylus verrucipes (big-eared chirping frog). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 472.

Carbajal-Marquez, Rubén A., Zaira Y. González-Saucedo and Gustavo E. Qunitero-Diaz. 2013. Aspidoscelis gularis (spotted whiptail) predation. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 505. [ redman031@hotmail.com]

Carlino, Piero and Olivier S. G. Pauwels. 2013. Zamenis situla (leopard snake) diet and feeding behavior. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 527. [ piero.carlino@msns.it]

Chepsongol, Roxanne M. and Douglas W. Burkett. 2013. Crotalus viridis (prairie rattlesnake) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 520-521.

Chiavacci, Scott J. and James C. Bednarz. 2013. Pantherophis obsoletus (Texas ratsnake) diet and feeding behavior. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 525. [ schiavacci@gmail.com]

Cintra, Carlos Eduardo D., Helder Lucio Rodrigues Da Silva and Nelson Jorge da Silva Junior. 2013. Scinax ruber predation. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 500. [carlos.e.cintra@gmail.com]

Connior, Matthew B. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Coluber constrictor priapus (southern black racer). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 475.

Connior, Matthew B. 2013. Lampropeltis calligaster calligaster (prairie kingsnake) anthropogenic mortality. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 523. [ mconnior@southark.edu]

Connor, Laurence L., Kenneth L. Krysko and Cathy Knott. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Leiocephaus carinatus (northern curly-tailed lizard). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 474-475.

Cooley, Christopher R., Stacey A. Smith, Carissa J. Geier and Talisa G. Puentes. 2013. The use of photo-identification as a means of identifying western painted turtles (Chrysemys picta bellii) in long-term demographic studies. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 430-432. [ ccooley@regis.edu]

Costa-Campos, Carlos E. and Naziel S. Souza. 2013. Tropidurus hispidus (Peter's lava lizard) saurophagy. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 515-516. [ eduardocampos@unifap.br]

Couto-Ferreira, Danilo, Eduardo Jose Dos Reis Dias and Igor Rios Do Rosario. 2013. Ameivula abaetnesis mating behavior. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 505. [danilocoutoferreira@gmail.com]

Davis, Jackie L. and Darrin M. Welchert. 2013. Pantherophis vulpinus (western fox snake) predation. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 525-526. [ jld24120@ucmo.edu]

De Albuquerque, Ralph Lacerda, Daniel Orsi Laranjeiras, Arielson Dos Santos Protazio, Diego Jose Santana, Ricardo Rodrigues, Daniel Oliveira Mesquita and Frederico Gustavo Rodrigues Franca. 2013. Helicops angulatus (watersnake) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 522-523. [ ralph.la@gmail.com]

De Carvalho, Vinícius T., Rafael de Fraga, Eduardo S. Eler, Ricardo A. Kawashita-Ribeiro, Eliana Feldberg, Richard C. Vogt, Marcos A. De Carvalho, Janaina da C. De Noronha, Luis Henrique Condrati and Shanna Bittencourt. 2013. Toad-headed pitviper Bothrocophias hyoprora (Amaral, 1935) (Serpentes, Viperidae): New records of geographic range in Brazil, hemipenial morphology, and chromosomal characterization. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 410-414. [ viniciustc@ig.com.br]

De Matos, Simone Arruda and Paulo Roberto Melo-Sampaio. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Siphlophis worontzowi (Worontzow's spotted night snake). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 477-478.

Demos, Terrence C., Bernard Agwanda and Edward A. Myers. 2013. Montatheris hindii (Kenya montane viper) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 524-525. [terrencedemos@gmail.com]

Do Rosario, Igor Rios, Vitor Gomes Santarosa, Luiz Eduardo de Oliveira Gomes, Anderson Raimundo Pinheiro Dos Santos, Diego Dias Bugarin and Eduardo José Dos Reis Dias. 2013. Herpetoculture notes: Ameivula abaetensis drinking behavior. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 452-453.

Douglas, Daniel A. and Andrea N. Drayer. 2013. Ambystoma maculatum (spottted salamander) unusual egg entrapment. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 489. [daniel.douglas@eku.edu]

Douglas, Daniel A. and Andrea N. Drayer. 2013. Lithobates sylvaticus (wood frog) egg predation entrapment. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 497. [ daniel.douglas@eku.edu]

Duellman, William E. 2013. Obituaries: In memory of Hobart Muir Smith (1912-2013): from humble beginnings to worldwide recognition. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 365-372. [ duellman@ku.edu]

Elsey, Ruth M. and Javier G. Nevarez. 2013. Alligator mississippensis (American alligator) report of a large fibrosarcoma in a wild alligator. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 503-504. [ relsey@wlf.la.gov]

Elston, Laura M., J. Hardin Waddle, Kenneth G. Rice and H. Franklin Percival. 2013. Co-occurrence of invasive Cuban treefrogs and native treefrogs in PVC pipe refugia. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 406-409. [ waddleh@usgs.gov]

Enge, Kevin. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Ambystoma talpoideum (mole salamander). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 470.

Enge, Kevin M. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Agkistrodon piscivorus conanti (Florida cottonmouth). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 475.

Enge, Kevin M. and Paul E. Moler. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Notophthalums viridescens louisianensis (central newt). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 470.

Evans, Lianne and Lu-anne Spencer-Hartle. 2013. Herpetoculture notes: Crotalus oreganus oreganus (northern Pacific rattlesnake) longevity. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 453.

Feldman, Chris R., Nathan C. Nieto, James B. Bettaso and C. M. Gienger. 2013. Sceloporus uniformis (yellow-backed spiny lizard) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 514. [ophis@unr.edu]

Fernández-Badillo, Leonardo, Nallely Morales-Capellán, Irene Goyenechea and Uriel Hernández-Salinas. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Crotalus intermedius (Mexican small-headed rattlesnake). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 475-476.

Finkler, Michael S. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Hyla versicolor (gray treefrog). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 472.

Finkler, Michael S. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Lithobates catesbeianus (bullfrog). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 472.

Finkler, Michael S. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Chelydra serpentina (snapping turtle). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 473.

Finkler, Michael S. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Trachemys scripta elegans (red-eared slider). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 473.

Flaherty, James P. and Josh Friers. 2013. Apalone ferox (Florida softshell) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 500. [ jflaherty1@my.apsu.edu]

Flaherty, James P., Michael C. Fulbright and C. M. Gienger. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Chelydra serpentina (snapping turtle). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 473.

Flaherty, James P., Michael C. Fulbright and C. M. Gienger. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Chrysemys dorsalis (southern painted turtle). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 473.

Flaherty, James P., Michael C. Fulbright and C. M. Gienger. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Storeria dekayi (Dekay's brownsnake). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 478.

Folt, Brian and David Laurencio. 2013. Agkistrodon contortrix (copperhead) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 517. [ brian.folt@gmail.com]

Foster, Nicole Y., Colleen Conway, Michele Dillashaw, Mary Christensen, Michael Williams, Melissa Antignane Blackmore, Sam Burress, Bethanie Ferguson, Amber Feustel, Chantia Gibson, Cameron Hargrove, Jared Johnston, Wyatt Kerr, Caitlin King, Anna Grace Lowry, Tabitha Manor, Bryce Mashburn, Rachel Melson, Neisha Newton, Kasin Sanders, Agustin Villaneuva, Hella Weber and Jessica White. 2013. Geographic distribution of herpetofauna of Middle Tennessee. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 484-486. [nfoster2@columbiastate.edu]

García, Ernesto Raya and Luis Fernando Martínez García. 2013. Herpetoculture notes: Phrynosoma asio (giant horned lizard) drinking behavior. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 453.

Goldberg, Stephen R. 2013. Phoenicolacerta laevis (Lebanon lizard) reproduction. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 512. [ sgoldberg@whittier.edu]

Goldberg, Stephen R., Kent R. Beaman and Jeanette Arreola. 2013. Plestidon lagunensis (San Lucan skink) reproduction. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 512-513. [sgoldberg@whittier.edu]

Graham, Sean P. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Pseudacris brachyphona (mountain chorus frog). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 472.

Gray, Brian S. 2013. Storeria dekayi (Dekay's brownsnake) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 527. [ brachystoma@hotmail.com]

Hamed, M. Kevin, Matthew J. Gray and Debra L. Miller. 2013. First report of ranavirus in Plethodontid salamanders from the Mount Rogers National Recreation Area, Virginia, USA. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 455-457. [ khamed@vhcc.edu]

Harner, Mary J., Jennifer N. Merlino and Greg D. Wright. 2013. Amphibian chytrid fungus in Woodhouse's toads, Plains leopard frogs, and American bullfrogs along the Platte River, Nebraska, USA. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 459-461. [ mharner@cranetrust.org]

Hathcock, Charles D. and Michael Hill. 2013. Pituophis catenifer (gophersnake) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 526. [ chuckhathcock89@gmail.com]

Hecht-Kardasz, Kirsten and Max A. Nickerson. 2013. Cryptobranchus alleganiensis (hellbender) larval diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 490. [ kirstenhecht@ufl.edu]

Henríquez, Vladlen and Eli Greenbaum. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Bolitoglossa salvinii (Salvin's mushroom-tongued salamander). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 470.

Hernández-Ruz, Emil José, Elciomar Araujo de Oliveira, Joyce Celerino De Carvalho and Isadora Fernandes De Franca. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Ranitomeya amazonica. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 472-473.

Herr, Mark W. and Sean P. Graham. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Lampropeltis elapsoides (scarlet kingsnake). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 476-477.

Heyer, W. Ronald. 2013. Obituaries: Paulo Emilio Vanzolini 25 April 1924-30 April 2013. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 362-365. [ heyerr@si.edu]

Himes, John G. 2013. Chrysemys picta (painted turtle) and Chelydra serpentina (snapping turtle) commensalism. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 501. [ john.himes@myfwc.com]

Himes, John G. 2013. Terrapene carolina (eastern box turtle) midwinter combat and reproductive behavior. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 502-503. [ john.himes@myfwc.com]

Hoaglund, Erica P. and Christopher E. Smith. 2013. New and updated records of amphibians and reptiles from Minnesota, USA. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 482-483. [christopher.smith@wildlifeRCS.com]

Holbrook, Joshua D., Cameron A. Younge, David P. Young, Jr. and Noah Greenwald. 2013. Nerodia floridana (Florida green watersnake) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 525. [jholbro8@fau.edu]

Hubbs, Brian. 2013. New county records and an update for Kansas and Nebraska, USA. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 481-482. [ tricolorbrian@hotmail.com]

Jahrling, Franziska, Anja Junghanns and Falk Ortlieb. 2013. Zootoca vivipara (common lizard) record weight. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 517. [ franziska.jaehrling@gmail.com]

Johnson, Marie, Sandra M. Tekmen and Mark A. Bee. 2013. Hyla chrysoscelis (Cope's gray treefrog) breeding activity. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 495. [marie.johnson22@gmail.com]

Jones, Cristina A., Joseph F. Banashek, Jarron J. Lucas and Aaron I. Wells. 2013. Coluber (=Masticophis) bilineatus (Sonoran whipsnake) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 518. [cjones@azgfd.gov]

Kamees, Larry and Andrew T. Holycross. 2013. Coluber (=Masticophis) bilineatus (Sonoran whipsnake) mortality. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 519. [ lkkamees@email.uark.edu]

Kissner, Jessica A. and Kerry L. Griffis-Kyle. 2013. Straight from the ungulate's mouth: a technique for protecting data-loggers. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 432-434. [jessica.kissner@ttu.edu]

Koski, Diogo Andrade, Aline P. Valadares Koski, Leonardo Mercon and Yuri Fanchini Messas. 2013. Hemidactylus mabouia (tropical house gecko) predation. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 509. [ diogokoski@yahoo.com.br]

Lamb, Jennifer Y. and Carl P. Qualls. 2013. Eurycea cirrigera (southern two-lined salamander) partial albino larva. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 490. [jennifer.lamb@eagles.usm.edu]

Lamb, Jennifer Y. and Carl P. Qualls. 2013. Necturus beyeri (Gulf Coast waterdog) detection by leaf litter bag. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 491. [ jennifer.lamb@eagles.usm.edu]

Lara-Tufiño, J. Daniel, Aurelio Ramírez-Bautista, Raquel Hernández-Austria and Christian Berriozabal-Islas. 2013. Ficimia streckeri (Tamaulipan hook-nosed snake) reproduction. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 522. [jdanieluah@hotmail. com]

Larson, Krista A., Brian G. Gall and Jeffrey T. Briggler. 2013. The use of gastric transmitters to locate nests and study movement patterns of breeding male Ozark hellbenders (Cryptobranchus alleganiensis bishopi). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 434-439. [ krista.larson@state.mn.us]

Lees, Alexander C, Ian Thompson and Felipe Bittioli R. Gomes. 2013. Hypsiboas cinerascens predation. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 495-496. [ felipebrgomes@yahoo.com.br]

Levis, Nicholas A. 2013. Lithobates sylvaticus (wood frog) unusual mortality. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 497-498. [ nicholas.levis655@topper.wku.edu]

Long, Andrea K. 2013. Sceloporus lundulatus (eastern fence lizard) feeding behavior. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 513-514. [ aklong@ufl.edu]

Luhring, Thomas M., J. Whitfield Gibbons and Parker W. Gibbons. 2013. Siren sp. predation. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 491-492. [ tmlhwb@mail.missouri.edu]

Macias-Rodriguez, Eduardo F., Ana Gatica-Colima and Hector Gadsden. 2013. Crotalus viridis (prairie rattlesnake) reproduction / combat. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 521. [eduamacias@gmail.com]

Marques, Marcio M., Larissa C. Costa and Flavio Mendes. 2013. Scinax cf. arduous (bromeliad frog) predation. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 499-500. [marcioherpetologia@gmail.com]

Mata-Silva, Vicente, Larry David Wilson and Jerry D. Johnson. 2013. Hemidactylus frenatus (common house gecko) predation. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 508-509. [vmata@utep.edu]

McAlpine, Donald F., Gregory F. M. Jongsma, Jane Watts and Eric Knopf. 2013. Hemidactylus scutatum (four-toed salamander) reproduction. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 490-491. [ donald.mcalpine@nbm-mnb.ca]

McCoy, Kristyn and Ximena E. Bernal. 2013. Leptodactylus savagei (South American bullfrog) locomotion and foraging. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 496. [kristyn.mccoy@ttu.edu]

McCranie, James R. and Alexander Gutsche. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Dendropsophus microcephalus (small-headed treefrog; rana trepadora amarilla). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 471.

McCranie, James R. and Alexander Gutsche. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Leptodactylus melanonotus (sabianl frog; ranita de Charco de Dos Espinas). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 472.

McCranie, James R. and Alexander Gutsche. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Coniophanes piceivittis (Cope's black-striped snake; culebra rayada). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 475.

McCranie, James R. and Alexander Gutsche. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Leptophis mexicanus (Mexican parrot snake; ranera Mexicana). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 477.

Medina-Rangel, Guido F. 2013. Norops fuscoauratus (slender anole) predation. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 511-512. [ guidofabianmedina@gmail.com]

Medina-Rangel, Guido F. and Martha L. Calderón. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Bachia guianensis (Guyana bachia). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 474.

Melo-Sampaio, Paulo Roberto, Bruno Luiz Alencar De Souza Melo, Alex Da Silva, Júnior Marcos Lima Maciel, Mariana Nogueira, Simone Matos De Arruda, Larissa Lima, Josimar Costa Da Silva and Lucicléia Matos. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Anolis dissimilis. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 473.

Mendelson, Joseph R., III. 2013. Book Review: Geckos: the animal answer guide. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 529-530. [ jmendelson@zooatlanta.org]

Merlen, Godfrey and Robert A. Thomas. 2013. A Galápagos ectothermic terrestrial snake gambles a potential chilly bath for a protein-rich dish of fish. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 415-417. [ merlenway@gmail.com]

Mitchell, Joseph C. and Lindsay H. Eiser. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Siren lacertina (greater siren). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 471.

Mochida, Koji, Tomohiko Shimada and Shizuka Tsuneki. 2013. Takydromus smaragdinus (green grass lizard) overwinter shelter. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 515. [kj.mochida@gmail.com]

Morato, Sergio Augusto Abrahao, Renato Silveira Bernils, Julio Cesar De Moura-Leite and Magno Vicente Segalla. 2013. Dipsas alternans (Jan's snail-eater, dormideira) defensive behavior. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 521-522. [ smorato@stcp.com.br]

Murphy, James B. 2013. Deadly encounters by and upon crocodilians depicted in historial illustrations and accounts. Part II. Assaults upon crocodilians. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 375-393. [ murphyj@si.edu]

Newman, Donald J., III and James R. Lee. 2013. Lampropeltis nigra (black kingsnake) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 523. [ dnewman@tnc.org]

Nicholson, Abbigail E. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Notophthalums viridescens (eastern newt). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 470.

Nicholson, Abbigail E. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Plestidon laticeps (broad-headed skink). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 475.

Nicholson, Abbigail E. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Lampropeltis triangulum (milksnake). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 477.

Novelli, Iara Alves, Glenda Fernanda Morton, Israel Tadeu Trindade and Fernando Antonio Frieiro-Costa. 2013. Urostrophus vautieri (Brazilian steppe iguana) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 516. [ iaranovelli27@gmail.com]

Pauwels, Olivier S. G. and Renaud Boistel. 2013. Book Review: Les Rainettes du Cameroun (Amphibiens Anoures). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 531-532. [osgpauwels@yahoo.fr]

Philips, John G. and Kirsten E. Nicholson. 2013. Bolitoglossa lignicolor (Camron mushroom-tongue salamander) prehensility. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 489. [ john-phillips@utulsa.edu]

Portik, Daniel M., Elia A. Mulungu, Dalila Sequeira and Jay P. McEntee. 2013. Herpetological surveys of the Serra Jeci and Namuli Massifs, Mozambique, and an annotated checklist of the southern Afromontane Archipelago. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 394-406. [ daniel.portik@berkeley.edu]

Rahman, Shahriar Caesar and A. H. M. Ali Reza. 2013. Fordonia leucobalia (crab-eating snake) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 522. [ caesar_rahman2004@yahoo.com]

Rajao, Henrique, Duarte Barros-Filho, Sergio Costa and Rafael Bessa. 2013. Leposternon microcephalus predation. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 509-510. [ henrique-rajao@puc-rio.br]

Ramesh, Rasika, Adam Lord, Kerry Griffis-Kyle, Gad Perry, Donna Hamilton and Shalika Silva. 2013. Amphibian populations in Brazos River Basin, Texas, show no evidence of Bd infection. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 461-464. [ rzr0030@auburn.edu]

Recchio, Ian and David Lazcano. 2013. Sceloporus lineatulus (Isla Santa Catalina spiny lizard) diet and accidental mortality. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 513. [ian.recchio@lacity.org]

Rhind, David, J. Sean Doody, Rachel Pritchard and Colin McHenry. 2013. Varanus panoptes (yellow-spotted monitor) cannibalism. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 516-517. [darhi@monash.edu.au]

Richter, Stephen C., Andrea N. Drayer, Jennifer R. Strong, Chelsea S. Kross, Debra L. Miller and Matthew J. Gray. 2013. High prevalence of ranavirus infection in permanent constructed wetlands in eastern Kentucky, USA. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 464-466. [ stephen.richter@eku.edu]

Rifai, Lina and Michael S. Finkler. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Storeria dekayi wrightorum (midland brownsnake). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 478.

Rivera, Mariana and Andrew K. Davis. 2013. Evaluating a method for non-destructively obtaining small volumes of blood from gilled amphibians. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 428-430. [ akdavis@uga.edu]

Rocha, Arturo, Vicente Mata-Silva, Jerry D. Johnson and William D. Lukefahr. 2013. Bogertophis subocularis (Trans-Pecos ratsnake) overwintering behavior. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 517-518. [ turyrocha@yahoo.com]

Rodríguez-Canseco, Jesús Mauricio, Matías Domínguez-Laso, Verónica Rosas Espinoza and Alberto Ayon-Escobedo. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Geophis bicolor (Mexican plateau earth snake). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 476.

Rodríguez-Canseco, Jesús Mauricio, Krystal Lucia Gonzalez-Estupinan and Luand Eliud López-Rodriguez. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Drymarchon melanurus (Central American indigo snake). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 476.

Rodríguez-Canseco, Jesús Mauricio and Luand Eliud González-Estupinan. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Anolis nebulosus (clouded anole). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 473-474.

Rodríguez-Canseco, Jesús Mauricio, John Pint, Verónica Rosas Espinoza, Ana Luisa Santiago Pérez, Alberto Ayon-Escobedo and Matías Domínguez-Laso. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Terrapene nelsoni (spotted box turtle). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 473.

Rojas-Rivera, Alejandra, Karen Castillo and Paul David Alfonso Gutierrez-Cardenas. 2013. Bothrocophias campbelli (Campbell's toad-headed pitviper, vibora boca de sapo de Campbell) diet/ophiophagy. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 518. [ alejandra.rojas-rivera@gmail.com]

Root, Shaun T. and Darrell Ahlers. 2013. Lampropeltis splendida (desert kingsnake) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 523-524. [ sroot@usbr.gov]

Rowley, Jodi J. L., Huy Duc Honag, Duong Thi Thuy Le, Vinh Quang Dau, Thy Neang and Trung Tien Cao. 2013. Low prevalence or apparent absence of Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis infection in amphibians from sites in Vietnam and Cambodia. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 466-469. [ jodi.rowley@austmus.gov.au]

Rubio-Morales, Beatriz, Sandra Fabiola Arias-Balderas, Alfonso Hérnandez-Ríos, Felipe Correa-Sánchez and Eduardo Cid-Méndez. 2013. Herpetoculture notes: Masticophis mentovarius (neotropical whipsnake) reproduction. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 453-454.

Rushton, Emily. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Lampropeltis calligaster occipitolineata (South Florida mole kingsnake). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 476.

Ryan, Mason J., Steven Poe, Ian M. Latella and Julian Davis. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Craugastor laevissimus. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 471.

Ryan, Mason J., Steven Poe, Eric W. Schaad and Alvaro J. Aguilar-Kirigan. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Ameerega hahneli. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 471.

Saenz, Daniel, Josh B. Pierce, James D Childress, Cory K. Adams and April A. Grady. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Anolis (=Norops) sagrei (brown anoles). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 474.

Sales, Raul F. D., Jaqueiuto S. Jorge, Marcelo N. de C. Kokubum and Eliza Freire, M. X. 2013. Leptodeira annulata (banded cat-eyed snake) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 524. [ raulsales17@gmail.com]

Santo-Pereira, Manuela, Frederico Batistella de Oliveira, Carlos Frederico Duarte Rocha and Tcheily Miriele Iapp. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Crossodactylus caramaschii. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 471.

Selman, Will and Al Cherry. 2013. Macrochelys temminckii (alligator snapping turtle) unusual habitat and trap survivability. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 501-502. [wselman@wlf.la.gov]

Servoss, Jeffrey M., Susan Sferra, Thomas R. Jones, Michael J. Sredl and Philip C. Rosen. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Ramphotyphlops braminus (Brahminy blindsnake). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 477.

Shedd, Jackson D. and Jonathan Q. Richmond. 2013. Conserved ontogeny of color pattern leads to the misdiagnosis of Scincid lizards of the Plestidon skiltonianus species complex. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 417-420. [ jackson.shedd@gmail.com]

Singleton, Jennifer M., Jodie Hearlson and R. Brent Thomas. 2013. Escape rates of semi-aquatic turtles from basking and funnel traps. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 442-444. [j.singleton@live.com]

Smith, Christopher E., Jaime Edwards and Jeffrey M. Lorch. 2013. Crotalus horridus (timber rattlesnake) fungal pathogens. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 519-520. [christopher.e.smith@state.mn.us]

Smith, Christopher E. and Myron B. Zimmer. 2013. Herpetoculture notes: Thamnophis radix (Plains gartersnake) reproduction / litter size. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 454.

Smith, Kevin P. W., M. Rockwell Parker and Walter F. Bien. 2013. Anaxyrus fowleri (Fowler's toad) interspecific nest use. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 492-493. [kevinpwsmith@gmail.com]

Solano, Liliana, Javier Sunyer, Kirsten E. Nicholson and Catherine Walton. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Dendropsophus phlebodes (veined tree frog). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 471-472.

Starrett, Bryan L. and Andrew T. Holycross. 2013. Coluber (=Masticophis) bilineatus (Sonoran whipsnake) maximum length. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 519. [bvipers@aol.com]

Steen, David A. 2013. Clemmys guttata (spotted turtle) reproduction. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 501. [ davidasteen@gmail.com]

Strain, Gabriel F., Thomas K. Pauley and James T. Anderson. 2013. Visible implant alphanumeric tag retention in green frog (Lithobates clamitans) tadpoles. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 440-442. [ gstrain54@yahoo.com]

Suson, Bryan. 2013. Crotalus atrox (western diamondback rattlesnake) diet and feeding behavior. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 519. [ bjsuson1@gmail.com]

Thawley, Christopher J., Gail L. McCormick and Sean P. Graham. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Heterodon platirhinos (eastern hog-nosed snake). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 476.

Thawley, Christopher J., Gail L. McCormick and Sean P. Graham. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Opheodrys aestivus (rough green snake). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 477.

Thomas, Robert A., Isaac Wyatt and Seth Wyatt. 2013. Chelydra serpentina (snapping turtle) diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 500-501. [ rathomas@loyno.edu]

Toledo, Maysa H. R. and Drausio H. Morais. 2013. Epicta tenellus (Guyana blind snake) predation. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 522. [ maysa_hrtoledo@hotmail.com]

Uriarte-Garzón, Pedro and Uri Omar García-Vázquez. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Geophis dugesii (Duges' earth snake). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 476.

Vasconcelos, Luciana, Ricardo Marques and Moacir Santos Tinoco. 2013. Tropidurus hygomi (Reinhardt's lava lizard) courtship behavior. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 514-515. [lucy.biologica@yahoo.com.br]

Vieira, Rafael Barbosa Da Silva, Rony Peterson Santos Almeida, Igor Rios Do Rosario and Eduardo Jose Dos Reis Dias. 2013. Ameivula abaetensis diet. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 504-505. [ scubavieira@hotmail.com]

Vieira, Rafael Barbosa Da Silva, Igor Rios dos Rosario, Luiz Eduardo De Oliveira and Eduardo Jose Dos Reis Dias. 2013. Tropidurus hygomi predation. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 516. [ scubavieira@hotmail.com]

Villa A., Martín F. and James C. Rorabaugh. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Sceloporus albiventris (western white-bellied spiny lizard). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 475.

Vrcibradic, Davor and Julia Niemeyer. 2013. Mabuya frenata, M. macrorhyncha tail bifurcation. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 510-511. [ davor@centroin.com.br]

Walker, James M., James E. Cordes, Stanley E. Trauth and Glenn J. Manning. 2013. Aspidoscelis neomexicana (New Mexico whiptail) x Aspidoscelis sexlineata viridis (prairie racerunner) duration of hybridization. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 505-507. [ jmwalker@uark.edu]

Williams, John T. and Thomas A. Sinclair. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Tantilla gracilis (flat-headed snake). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 478.

Wolff, Brian G., Eric Wurm and Lisa Tracy. 2013. Pseudacris cruciferi (spring peeper) myiasis. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 498-499. [ wolff017@tc.umn.edu]

Yeager, Justin. 2013. Dendrobatidae and Bufo coniferus defense. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 494. [ jyeager@tulane.edu]

Yousefkhani, Seyyed Saeed Hosseinian, Masoud Yousefi, Eskandar Rastegar-Pouyani and Nasrullah Rastegar-Pouyani. 2013. Lizards from Qeshm Island, Iran. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 486-488. [ mesalina.watsonana@gmail.com]

Zavaleta, Israel Solano, Luis Canseco Márquez and Eric Centenero Alcala. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Celestus ennegrammus (huaxteca lesser galliwasp). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 474.

Zavaleta, Israel Solano, Luis Canseco Márquez, Andrés Alberto Mendoza Hernández and Luis Felipe Vázquez Vega. 2013. Geographic Distribution: Pseudoeurycea cafetalera (coffee grove salamander). Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 470-471.

Zylstra, Erin R. and Michael K. Ward. 2013. Hyla arenicolor (canyon treefrog) habitat use. Herpetological Review. 44 (3): 494-495. [ ezylstra@email.arizona.edu]

Contents compiled by Ruthe Smith Courtesy Zen Scientist and HerpDigest

South American Journal of Herpetology 8(1)

South American Journal of Herpetology 8(1)
Contents:
Alencar, Laura Rodrigues Vieira de, Marilia P. Gaiarsa and Marcio Martins. 2013. The evolution of diet and microhabitat use in Pseudoboine snakes. South American Journal of Herpetology. 8 (1): 60-66. [ alencarlrv@gmail.com]
Forlani, Mauricio C., Caio Vinicius de Mira Mendes, Iuri Ribeiro Dias, Danilo Silva Ruas, João Filipe Riva Tonini and Rafael O. de Sa. 2013. The advertisement calls and distribution of two sympatric species of Chiasmocleis (Mehely 1904) (Anura, Microhylidae, Gastrophryninae) from the Atlantic Forest. South American Journal of Herpetology. 8 (1): 46-51. [ mcforlani@gmail.com]
Jimenez-Rivillas, Carlos, Laura M. Vargas, Jose M. Fang, Juliana Di Filippo and Juan M. Daza. 2013. Advertisement call of Diasporus anthrax (Lynch, 2001) (Anura: Eleuthrodactylidae) with comparisons to calls from congeneric species. South American Journal of Herpetology. 8 (1): 1-4. [ jumadaza@gmail.com]
Kok, Philippe J. R., bert Willaert and D. Bruce Means. 2013. A new diagnosis and description of Anomaloglossus roraima (La Marca, 1998) (Anura: Aromobatidae: Anomaloglossinae), with description of its tadpole and call. South American Journal of Herpetology. 8 (1): 29-45. [ philippe.kok@naturalsciences.be]
McComb Pinto, Rebeca, Sarah Sampaio Py-Daniel and Marcelo Menin. 2013. Redescription of the tadpole of Phyllomedusa bicolor (Anura: Hylidae) from Central America. South American Journal of Herpetology. 8 (1): 67-72. [ menin@ufam.edu.br]
Noss, A. J., R. R. Montaño F., F. Soria, S. L. Deem, C. V. Fiorello and L. A. Fitzgerald. 2013. Chelonoidis carbonaria (Testudines: Testudinidae) activity patterns and burrow use in the Bolivian Chaco. South American Journal of Herpetology. 8 (1): 19-28. [ anoss@ufl.edu]
Rivas, Gilson A., Gabriel N. Ugueto, Walter E. Schargel, Tito R. Barros, Pablo Velozo and Luz Esther Sanchez. 2013. A distinctive new species of Gonatodes (Squamata: Sphaerodactylidae) from Isla La Blanquilla, Venezuela, with remarks on the distribution of some other Caribbean Sphaerodactylid lizards. South American Journal of Herpetology. 8 (1): 5-18. Gonatodes naufragus sp. nov. [ anolis30@hotmail.com]
Tarano, Zaida and Eloisa Fuenmayor. 2013. Mate choice based on acoustic features in Johnstone's Whistling Frog Eleutherodactylus johnstonei: An experimental approach. South American Journal of Herpetology. 8 (1): 52-59. [ zaida.tarano@ciens.ucv.ve]

Courtesy HerpDigest and ZenScientist

Current Herpetology 32(1) 8/1/13

Table of Contents:

Allingham, Shaun Michael and Martyn Harvey. 2013. Effects of different fire regimes on amphibian communities in the Nyika National Park, Malawi. Current Herpetology. 32 (1): 1-8. [ natrix36@hotmail.com]

Anonymous. 2013. Titles of papers presented in the 51st Annual Meeting of the Herpetological Society of Japan (10-11 November 2012 at Aichigakusen University, Toyota). Current Herpetology. 32 (1): 71-75.

Goldberg, Stephen R. 2013. Reproduction in the Many-lined Sun Skink, Eutropis multifasciata (Squamata: Scincidae) from Sarawak, Malaysia. Current Herpetology. 32 (1): 61-65. [ sgoldberg@whittier.edu]

Ito, Ryo, Isami Ikeuchi and Akira Mori. 2013. A day gecko darkens its body color in response to avian alarm calls. Current Herpetology. 32 (1): 26-33. [ ryo.j.h.ito@gmail.com]

Kurita, Takaki. 2013. Current status of the introduced Common House Gecko, Hemidactylus frenatus (Squamata: Gekkonidae), on Amamioshima Island of the Ryukyu Archipelago, Japan. Current Herpetology. 32 (1): 50-60. [ mofumofu_monticola@hotmail.co.jp]

Nishikawa, Kanto, Masafumi Matsui and Tao Thien Nguyen. 2013. A new species of Tylototriton from northern Vietnam (Amphibia, Urodela, Salamandridae). Current Herpetology. 32 (1): 34-49. Tylototriton ziegleri sp. nov. [ hynobius@zoo.zool.kyoto-u.ac.jp]

Takeuchi, Hirohiko, Mizuki Takeuchi and Tsuotomu Hikida. 2013. Extremely low genetic diversity in the Japanese population of Zootoca vivipara (Squamata: Lacertidae) revealed by Mitochondrial DNA. Current Herpetology. 32 (1): 66-70. [ hirohiko@zoo.zool.kyoto-u.ac.jp]

Yoshikawa, Natsuhiko and Masafumi Matsui. 2013. A new salamander of the genus Onychodactylus from Tsukuba Mountains, Eastern Honshu, Japan (Amphibia, Caudata, Hynobiidae). Current Herpetology. 32 (1): 9-25. Onychodactylus tsukubaensis sp. nov. [ fumi@zoo.zool.kyoto-u.ac.jp]

 Courtesy of HerpDigest and ZenScientist

TRADE IN NON-NATIVE AMPHIBIANS AND REPTILES IN TEXAS (Via Herp Digest)

TRADE IN NON-NATIVE AMPHIBIANS AND REPTILES IN TEXAS: LESSONS FOR BETTER MONITORING AND IMPLICATIONS FOR SPECIES INTRODUCTION
HEATHER L. PRESTRIDGE, LEE A. FITZGERALD, AND TOBY J. HIBBITTS

Texas Cooperative Wildlife Collection, Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Sciences, Texas A&M University, 210 Nagle Hall, College Station, Texas 77843, USA, e-mail: hlprestridge@tamu.edu

Paper posted at

http://herpconbio.org/Volume_6/Issue_3/Prestridge_etal_2011.pdf

Herpetological Conservation and Biology 6(3):324-339.

Abstract.-In the United States, trade is monitored at different levels of government and state level insight requires combining federal, state, and local sources of information. Trade in wildlife and their products has implications on wild populations of species involved and introduction of non-native vertebrates, especially amphibians and reptiles, is linked to the commercial trade in these animals. We used:













(1) federal databases;






(2) surveys of pet owners at live animal expositions;






(3) observations of sales at live animals expositions; and






(4) data collected from dealers on the Internet













...to quantify imports, exports, and use of exotic herptiles traded in Texas.













We recorded 1,192 unique taxonomic entities of amphibians and reptiles in commercial trade in Texas. A total of 949,901 live specimens were imported to Texas from 2002 to 2008. The top 16 imported taxa made up 73.36% of the trade. Internet and exposition-based trade was dominated by few species of common pets, with others represented in small numbers. Much trade persists in known invasive species and others that must have the potential to become invasive. We documented trade in 36 known invasive species, three of which are invasive in Texas. Our approach could serve as a template for assessing trade in non-native species at regional scales. Modifications to national databases would allow exports to be distinguished from re-exports, and adoption of standardized taxonomy would improve understanding of impacts of trade on species. State level management changes should be consistent across all 50 states to add continuity to laws governing non-native amphibians and reptiles kept as pets.

PASSAGE OF AMPHIBIANS ACROSS ROADS

EFFECTIVE CULVERT PLACEMENT AND DESIGN TO FACILITATE PASSAGE OF
AMPHIBIANS ACROSS ROADS

Journal of Herpetology 44(4): 618-626

David A. Patrick, Christopher M. Schalk, James P. Gibbs & Hara W. Woltz

Abstract: Efficient deployment of culverts to mitigate mortality of amphibians on roadways requires identification of locations within road networks where animals cross (hotspots), points within identified hotspots for culvert placement, and attributes of culverts that make them behaviorally palatable to migrating individuals. In this study, we assessed road crossing frequency of Spotted Salamanders, Ambystoma maculatum, and American Toads, Anaxyrus americanus, along a 700-m transect within a known crossing hotspot, and related these distributions to habitat variables within the hotspot including the presence of existing culverts. We also placed experimental arrays of culverts of varying attributes in the path of migrating Spotted Salamanders to examine culvert preference by salamanders under typical movement environments and appropriate animal behavioral states. Our studies of patterns of road occurrence demonstrated that both species avoided crossing where there was a wetl!
and within 15 m of the downslope of the road and that neither species showed a strong preference for crossing near existing culverts. When considering the choice for experimental culverts by Spotted Salamanders, we found no preference for culverts of varying aperture size, length, or substrate. Our results indicate that patterns of occurrences of the two species of amphibian within a crossing hotspot may be linked to the physical attributes at the site. For Spotted Salamanders in particular, predicting where they will cross within a hotspot may not be easy. Spotted Salamanders showed little preference for culverts of different design, indicating that a variety of culvert designs can suffice for mitigation if placed in appropriate locations.

*****

A pdf of this article is available from the CNAH PDF Library at

http://www.cnah.org/cnah_pdf.asp

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.2

Herpetological Conservation and Biology New Issue Announcement & Bibliography

Herpetological Conservation and Biology New Issue Announcement & Bibliography

Volume 6, Issue 1, April 2011

The Editorial Staff at Herpetological Conservation and Biology is pleased to announce the release of the latest issue, Volume 6(1). Our redesigned website has many enhanced features. We encourage you to investigate the new website and join our mailing list or our growing community on Facebook. Signing up will ensure you receive the latest news and updates about Herpetological Conservation and Biology!

The content of Volume 6(1) includes a "HerpSpectives" article, and also a section devoted to Techniques. All of our issues are open-access and freely available to anyone interested. The Governing Board extends its sincerest thanks to authors and readers alike; our success is only made possible by your continued support.

Sincerely,



Rob Lovich, PhD.
Communications Editor
Herpetological Conservation and Biology
rlovich@herpconbio.org



HerpSpectives
On the Threat to Snakes of Mesh Deployed For Erosion Control and Wildlife Exclusion.
Joshua M. Kapfer and Rori A. Paloski

Research Articles
Cnemidophorus lemiscatus (Squamata: Teiidae) on Cayo Cochino Pequeno, Honduras: Extent of Island Occupancy, Natural History, and Conservation Status.
Chad E. Montgomery, Scott M. Boback, Stephen E.W. Green, Mark A. Paulissen, and James M. Walker

Effects of Temperature and Temporal Factors on Anuran Detection Probabilities at Cape Cod National Seashore, Massachusetts, USA: Implications for Long-term Monitoring.
Robert P. Cook, Todd A. Tupper, Peter W.C. Paton, and Brad C. Timm

Population Densities, Activity, Microhabitats, and Thermal Biology of a Unique Crevice- and Litter-dwelling Assemblage of Reptiles on Union Island, St. Vincent and the Grenadines.
Ehren J. Bentz, Mel José Rivera Rodríguez, Rebecca R. John, Robert W. Henderson, and Robert Powell

Turtle Populations at a Heavily Used Recreational Site: Ichetucknee Springs State Park, Columbia County, Florida.

Kenneth J. Chapin and Peter A. Meylan

Sonoran Desert Snake Communities at Two Sites: Concordance and Effects of Increased Road Traffic.
Thomas R. Jones, Randall D. Babb, Frank R. Hensley, Christine LiWanPo, and Brian K. Sullivan

The Potential Demise of a Population of Adders (Vipera berus) in Smygehuk, Sweden.
Thomas Madsen and Beata Ujvari

Predicting Lizard Gender: Sexual Dimorphism in Calotes rouxii (Reptilia: Agamidae) from Agumbe, Karnataka, India.
Rachakonda Sreekar, Katya Saini, Shyam N. Rao, and Chetana B. Purushotham

A Power Analysis for the Use of Counts in Egg Masses to Monitor Wood Frog (Lithobates sylvaticus) Populations.
Rick D. Scherer and Jeff A. Tracey

Biases in the Protection of Peripheral Anuran Populations in the United States.
Ryan P. O'Donnell and Andrew P. Rayburn

Assessment of the Vulnerability of the Oregon Spotted Frog (Rana pretiosa) to the Amphibian Chytrid Fungus (Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis).
Gretchen E. Padgett-Flohr and Marc P. Hayes

Herpetofaunal Endemism and Diversity in Tropical Forests of Mt. Hamiguitan in the Philippines.
Richel E. Relox, Emmanuel P. Leańo, and Fritzie B. Ates-Camino

Herpetological Surveys of Forest Fragments Between Montagne d'Ambre National Park and Ankarana Special Reserve, Northern Madagascar.
Louise Durkin, Mark D. Steer, and Elise M.S. Belle

Herpetofauna of the Cedar Glades and Associated Habitats of the Inner Central Basin of Middle Tennessee.
Matthew L. Niemiller, R. Graham Reynolds, Brad M. Glorioso, Jeremy Spiess, and Brian T. Miller

Techniques

A Backpack Method for Attaching GPS Transmitters to Bluetongue Lizards (Tiliqua, Scincidae).
Samantha J. Price-Rees and Richard Shine

The Development of a Cost Effective Method for Measuring the Variation of Area in Contrasting Scute Pigmentation in Chelonians.
Ryan C.J. Walker

Evaluating a Novel Technique for Individual Identification of Anuran Tadpoles Using Coded Wire Tags.
Ryan A. Martin

HERPETOLOGY NOTES WEBSITE

Dear all,

Probably some of you have noticed that the Herpetology Notes website has experienced some problems in the last three weeks. The reason was a hacker attack on the web space where, among others, the SEH website, Herpetology Notes, and the World Congress of Herpetology websites are hosted. The hackers flooded all these pages with malware. Therefore both Google and our web provider blocked some of the pages and domains.

It took us some time to understand what has happened and to remove the malware, which partly was deeply emdedded in some of the html pages, but we are confident that this part of the problem has now been solved. All pages should now be clean and safe again. However, we anticipate that it will take some time before all
access restrictions will be removed.

To overcome the current problems I have created a new subdomain to allow continued access to Herpetology Notes. Please note the new web address of Herpetology Notes where the journal files are now available again:
http://www.herpetologynotes.seh-herpetology.org/



As soon as possible also the old Herpetology Notes web address will be made functional again and then will be redirecting to this new address.

Apologies for this trouble!

Miguel Vences
(Vice President SEH)

--
Prof. Dr. Miguel Vences
Technical University of Braunschweig
Zoological Institute
Mendelssohnstr. 4
38106 Braunschweig
Germany

Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.9

THE TURTLE CONTROVERSY CONTINUES

http://cryptozoologynews.blogspot.com/2011/02/shameful-shell-games-continue-via-herp.html

The other day we posted an article `The Shameful Shell Game` which originally appeared in HerpDigest. The latest edition of HerpDigest includes the following letter:

Some Correction and Opinions on the Article "The Shameful Shell Game" From Mark Feldman of New Zealand. (Editor-Mr. Feldman is a turtle researcher who has lately been doing a lot of research on the chemical inducement to turtle egg-laying. He has been apply to do this research with the help of the Turtle Farms mentioned in the article who supply him with turtles and space to do set up his lab. If this makes him a biased or expert who can respond to the errors, and there were errors, is us to you, the reader.)

Dear HerpDigest,

Just recently HerpDigest published an article called the "Shameful Shell Game." Many facts in the article were outdated and there were errors of interpretation as well.

1. ".there are 80 turtle farms in Louisiana alone." There were actually 48 farms still in business in early 2010 but probably less now because they are going out of business at a rapid rate. They are going out of business because the Chinese are purchasing fewer turtles each year as the build up their breeding stock and compete directly with the American farms. American turtle farmers that took out bank loans to enter the "boom" during the 1980s-early 1990s when the Chinese were buying hatchlings for over a dollar each (price now around 20 cents) have suffered the most. The older farms, with no loans and a wealth of experience have done better.

2. ".these farms are not self sufficient and thousands of adult sliders are removed from the wild each year to replace senile breeding stock."

The situation is actually that there is a glut of breeding stock. This is why a shipment of 40 tons of ADULT red-ears was sent to Vietnam this year. (Editor-Which Vietnam refused and send back to the U.S.- Sliders are illegal to export to Vietnam and condition of turtles was unacceptable.) These turtles were breeders from the USA that were surplus and no longer wanted. The decline in the industry and bankruptcy of the farms has resulted in the release of many thousands of adult breeders and the butchering of others for food to be sold in the Chinese communities in NY and California.
Turtles do not become "senile." They breed into old age. I have seen thousands of animals that have been on farms for over 40 years and are still laying several clutches a year.
Turtles are resourceful animals and escape frequently from turtle farms. If you tour wild areas around the farms you will note large numbers of turtles on the roadsides during nesting season. It is true that these animals do have the potential to alter the genetic pool of the local turtles. Whether this is more than an academic problem remains to be seen.

"Today over 200,000 farmed pet turtles continue to be sold in this country each
year and nearly ten million are shipped to international pet markets."

The legitimate trade in over 4 inch farmed turtles in the USA is about 60,000 per year. Annual exports of hatchlings vary widely. Using the LEMIS date (which is the best we have but not really accurate) there were 14.8 million exports last year but almost 2/3 of those were for the food trade in Asia, not for pets. (Editor-Question where did those 14.8 million turtles come from the farms or wild, as their is a large business in catching wild turtles and sending them to China according to Jeff Miller of the Center for Biological Diversity).

4. "Eggs taken from the wild be hatched and the young will be sold in any number of venues."

Taking eggs from the wild is seldom worthwhile. Such eggs need to be gathered within the first 24 hours or after three weeks to avoid mortality. It is far more efficient to use farmed animals where the hatching rate is 85%. Hatchling turtles that end up being sold illegally in the USA almost always come from back-yard farmers that produce a thousand hatchlings or less a year. No big farmers would risk their business to get involved in this illegal trade.

5. "The IUCN lists this turtle among the 100 most dangerous."

This is true but ill deserved. Red-ears are NOT super turtles. Like any other animal they have strict requirements in order to survive and reproduce. Buddhist countries like Korea, Taiwan, and Vietnam buy large numbers of hatchlings to be released during religious ceremonies. This has to cause problems; if you release a million hatchling red-ears a year there's bound to be an effect even if they can't reproduce or survive for very long.

6. "They are on every continent..and even islands like New Zealand, the Bahamas and Cuba now support feral populations of red-eared sliders."

There are no reproducing feral populations of red-ears in New Zealand. Adults that are released can survive for a few years but inevitably die from shell disease and starvation because our winters are too warm and summers too cool. There are tiny areas north of Brisbane, Australia where the environment is more suitable for red-ears and they may reproduce there in artificial impoundments. However, the bulk of the country is too dry for the eggs to hatch. This is why Australian turtles have hard shelled eggs.

There are areas in Europe (Southern France) where red-ears can reproduce and do compete to variable degrees with the native pond turtle but there are many other areas in Europe where that is not the case. Again, red-ears are not super turtles; they usually end up surviving the longest in ponds in parks and where local turtle populations have been extinguished already.

7. "When the European Union banned the importation of red-eared sliders the turtle farmers circumvented this and cross-bred them with yellow bellied sliders and shipped their customized, genetically designed young turtles to Europe."

There's some truth here. With the ban of red-ears in the EU, American turtle farmers began exporting yellow-bellied and cumberland sliders. These animals do interbreed with red-ears and crosses are produced but it is not purposeful since the pure bred yellow bellied and cumberland sliders can be legally imported into the EU anyway. Most farmers isolate their cumberlands and yellow bellies from the red-ears because they are of higher value in the pet trade.

"Based on the hybrid swarms of hatchling map turtles produced and sold by turtle farmers we know that Graptemys readily hybridize."

It is true that map turtles interbreed on turtle farms (they can even produce off-spring with red-ears) but it is also true that they interbreed in the wild.

The real issue that needs to be addressed is whether or not people are going to be allowed to keep turtles as pets. If we want to have a society where people can have pet turtles, than turtle farms are the most efficient way to produce them. On a farm 85% of the eggs are hatched successfully but in the wild less than 5% of the eggs survive long enough to make it to the water. A well run turtle farm requires no additions to the adult stock since they can produce their own breeders in 4-5 years at very little additional expense. Breeders taken from the wild require 2-3 years to acclimate to the captive environment of a turtle farm and lay few, if any, eggs in that time. So farmers have little to lose by breeding their own stock.

The state of Louisiana has developed a protocol to prevent the transmission of salmonella via hatchling turtles. It is very effective. However, it does not prevent a pet turtle from getting salmonella from the food (raw chicken) it is fed or proximity to other pets (chickens, donkeys, cows, etc). Recent attempts to eliminate salmonella from chicken eggs in the USA may help to solve this problem.

It would be a real shame if young people could not keep pet turtles. I'm sure that all of us had herps as pets when we were young and that has added a great deal to the quality of our lives. It is my view that we should ban the wholesale capture of wild turtles throughout the United States and support active turtle farming so we can do as little damage to the natural populations as possible.


Mark Feldman
Kerikeri, New Zealand

FROM HERPDIGEST: Can we use the tadpoles of Australian frogs to reduce recruitment of invasive cane toads?

Can we use the tadpoles of Australian frogs to reduce recruitment of invasive cane toads?
Elisa Cabrera-Guzmán, Michael Crossland, Richard Shine
Article first published online: 12/23/10, Journal of Applied Ecology
How to Cite
Cabrera-Guzmán, E., Crossland, M. and Shine, R. , Can we use the tadpoles of Australian frogs to reduce recruitment of invasive cane toads?. Journal of Applied Ecology, no. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2664.2010.01933.x
Author Information
School of Biological Sciences A08, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia
*Correspondence: Richard Shine,
*Correspondence: Correspondence author. E-mail: rick.shine@sydney.edu.au

Summary
1. Native to the Americas, cane toads Bufo marinus are an invasive species causing substantial ecological impacts in Australia. We need ways to control invasive species such as cane toads without collateral damage to native fauna.

2. We explored the feasibility of suppressing survival and growth of cane toad tadpoles via competition with the tadpoles of native frogs. Compared to the invasive toads, many native frogs breed earlier in the season and their tadpoles grow larger and have longer larval periods. Hence, adding spawn or tadpoles of native frogs to toad-breeding sites might increase tadpole competition, and thereby reduce toad recruitment.

3. Our laboratory trials using tadpoles of eight native frog species gave significant results: the presence of six of these species (Cyclorana australis, C. longipes, Litoria caerulea, L. dahlii, L. rothii and L. splendida) reduced toad tadpole survival and/or size at metamorphosis. Litoria caerulea also increased the duration of the larval period of cane toad tadpoles. Tadpoles of the other two frog species (Litoria rubella and Litoria tornieri) did not affect survival or growth of larval cane toads any more than did an equivalent number of additional toad tadpoles. Native frog species with larger tadpoles exerted greater negative effects on toad tadpoles than did native species with smaller tadpoles.

4.Synthesis and applications. Encouraging the general public to construct and restore waterbodies in peri-urban areas to build up populations of native frogs - especially the much-loved green tree frog Litoria caerulea- could help to reduce recruitment rates of invasive cane toads in Australia.

NEW SPANISH HERP JOURNAL

We are pleased to announce the publication launch of Basic and Applied Herpetology, a continuation of the Revista Española de Herpetología, the journal of the Spanish Herpetological Society that has been publishedyearly since 1986. Basic and Applied Herpetology (B&AH) is a peer-reviewed scientific journal that publishes original research papers, reviews and short notes, dealing with any aspect of amphibians and reptile biology worldwide.

In response to the demands of the herpetological community worldwide, the Spanish Herpetological Society wish to create a fast publication for a broader audience. Although articles in Spanish are welcome, the new editorial board wish to open the journal to a wider public, giving priority to manuscripts written in English. Moreover, to make the decimation of scientific data as fast as possible, editorial decisions regarding manuscripts submitted to B&AH will be communicated within 90 days. Shortly after acceptance and galley proof correction, a PDF version of the paper will be available online in the journal website.

Detailed information regarding guidelines to authors and submissionprocess is available in our web site:

http://www.herpetologica.es/publicaciones/basic-and-applied-herpetology

NEW HERP JOURNAL

I'm pleased to announce that the first issue of Amphibia-Reptilia (2011) is available on-line on Ingenta to subscribers: http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/brill/amre/2011/00000032/00000001


It includes 10 articles, 5 short-notes, 1 book review and the editorial report 2009.

Best wishes and Happy New Year,



Mathieu Denoël F.R.S. - FNRS Research Associate
Co-Editor of Amphibia-Reptilia Behavioural Biology Unit
University of Liege22 Quai van Beneden4020 Liege (Belgium)
Tel: (+32) 04.366.50.84

Web site: http://www.etho.ulg.ac.be/denoel/home.html

Orbi (publications): http://orbi.ulg.ac.be/simple-search?locale=en&query=denoel+mathieu

INTERESTING OPPORTUNITY

A Great Opportunity For a Herp Habitat Restoration Project!

The 5 Star Wetland and Stream Restoration Grants request for proposals is now open. The Five Star Restoration Program seeks to develop community capacity to sustain local natural resources for future
generations by providing modest financial assistance to diverse local partnerships for wetland, riparian, and coastal habitat restoration. The National Association of Counties, the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF), the Wildlife Habitat Council (WHC), in cooperation with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Southern Company, and FedEx, are pleased to solicit applications for Five Star.

Applications must be submitted online by midnight EST, Monday, Feb. 14.

More information is available at:
http://www.nfwf.org/fivestar/
http://www.epa.gov/owow/wetlands/restore/5star/

Thanks,
Jason M. Daniels
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region 7
Watershed Support, Wetland and Stream Protection Section
901 N. 5th
Kansas City, KS 66101
daniels.jason@epa.gov

FROM HERPDIGEST. I am reprinting this in its entirety because I think that it is an important issue

Oakland Invades the Desert - Four East Bay companies are leading the rush to develop utility-scale solar power. But some environmentalists suggest there's a big price to pay.
East Bay Express, 12/8/10 by Nate Seltenrich

Rising rebelliously from the desert floor on the northern end of Ivanpah Valley, the town of Primm, Nevada, calls to mind man's triumph over nature. Its gaudy fashion outlet and three hotel-casinos crowd the freeway just east of the California border near the Mojave National Preserve, contrasting severely with the flat expanse surrounding on all sides. Nearby, the world-class 36-hole Primm Valley Golf Club sports glowing green lawns and luxuriant water features. And, across the highway, a cement factory and natural gas power plant spew greenhouse gases.

To the typical traveler passing by on the way to Las Vegas, the town and its neighbors amount to a surreal desert outpost. Little do most know that not far away, another drama between man and the environment is playing out. And its implications could be far greater.

Five miles from Primm, on the valley's western slope, Oakland company BrightSource Energy aims to build what will be, at least for a while, the world's largest solar-thermal power plant. Drawn by the valley's 330 days of sun per year and heat-intensifying 3,300-foot elevation, the project will encompass 5.6 square miles and generate 370 megawatts - enough to power 140,000 homes at peak hours - when it's complete in 2013. It will nearly double the amount of commercial solar thermal power produced in the United States today.

The project is the first in a wave of utility-scale solar energy plants being constructed on public lands that will soon dwarf BrightSource's groundbreaking venture. And a surprisingly large number of them will be built by companies based right here in the East Bay. The entire California desert is under siege by solar power developers, thanks to federal incentives promoting renewable energy that expire at the end of the year, along with California's call for public utilities to draw 33 percent of their power from renewable sources by 2020 (versus today's 14 percent) and a critical mass of interest in the state's untapped solar resources. Under the guidance of the US Department of the Interior, both the California Energy Commission and Bureau of Land Management have approved seven huge solar plants on federal land in the desert since late August, and more are on the way. At least one hundred applications are waiting to be reviewed. "We're open for business with respect to renewable energy on public lands," US Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced in October.

Combined, the seven approved plants will contribute a total of 3,492 megawatts to California's energy grid - at peak output, the equivalent to several nuclear power plants. More striking, however, is the amount of public land they'll eat up: according to current site designs, more than 27,000 acres. Two more plants may be approved by the end of the year, adding another 650 megawatts and 6,600 acres. In all, that's 53 square miles - roughly the size of the City of Oakland. The energy they produce should help power between one and two million homes.

Not only does this boom cycle represent the beginning of one of the largest transfers of land from public to private use in US history, but the amount of new power being added to the grid in such a short time, especially renewable, is likewise unparalleled, said Tom Pogacnik, deputy state director of natural resources for the Bureau of Land Management. Adam Eventov, spokesman for BrightSource's Ivanpah project, likened the atmosphere to "the wild, wild West."

Yet the mad rush to develop poses serious consequences for desert ecosystems, which are easily damaged and slow to regenerate. In the Ivanpah Valley, for example, what may look like a barren field of tumbleweed is in fact a thriving desert scrub ecosystem featuring Mojave yucca, multiple species of cholla cactus, and creosote scrub, one of the oldest living plants on Earth. While nothing in the valley grows much taller than a few feet, it's enough to provide habitat for a variety of animal species including kangaroo rats, burrowing owls, desert horned lizards, migratory bighorn sheep, and the endangered - and highly vulnerable - desert tortoise. The floor and eastern end of the valley also serves as a natural floodplain called Ivanpah Dry Lake, collecting rainwater from the mountains that ring the valley.

Solar development in the desert has thus pitted environmentalists against environmentalists, renewable-energy advocates against conservationists, and global-warming activists against ecologists. In some cases, projects have been stalled by the infighting; in most, their designs have been modified. Environmental groups have sought to walk the narrow path between encouraging green energy and protecting desert habitat, while developers have struggled to meet federally imposed deadlines with minimal collateral damage. The process has been anything but smooth: BrightSource's Ivanpah project alone took three years to permit, both by virtue of being first and because of nagging land-use issues.

Solar power's rise can be largely attributed to two key environmental benefits: it's almost infinitely renewable and emits no greenhouse gases. But in addition to its environmental costs, solar power remains expensive. The per-kilowatt-hour production cost of solar energy, while falling rapidly, remains about triple that of most other forms of renewable energy, and approximately double that of most coal and natural gas plants, according to a study released earlier this year by the California Energy Commission.

Nevertheless, three other East Bay companies - FirstSolar, Solar Millennium, and SunPower - have joined BrightSource at the forefront of utility-scale solar development in the United States. "In many ways, the East Bay is central to our nation's solar industry," said Keely Wachs, senior director of corporate communications for BrightSource. "It's ground zero for most of the meaningful solar development." It's also, according to some desert conservationists, complicit in an ill-considered attack on the desert.

No single factor is responsible for the fact that four of the nation's largest solar companies are based in the East Bay, but the area's central location, affordable rents, and burgeoning green corridor all played a role. Two of the companies, FirstSolar and Solar Millennium, occupy separate floors in the same glass-sheathed modern office building at the corner of 11th Street and Broadway in downtown Oakland. BrightSource is located nearby at 20th and Harrison streets, while SunPower is housed in Richmond's historic Ford Point building.

Together these companies maintain an air of cooperative competition. According to SunPower's director of market development, Greg Blue, they have close ties but are also acutely aware of the competition among them - to develop the best technologies, attract the best investors, and sign the best power purchase agreements with utility companies. They're partners in the Large-Scale Solar Association, a California-based trade association with twelve members, but won't share what Blue calls "commercial secrets."

SunPower, founded 25 years ago in San Jose, is one of the oldest solar companies in the world. It has 800 employees, split between offices in Richmond and San Jose. The company pioneered the photovoltaic solar power plant business, said corporate communications director Ingrid Ekstrom, and has built 550 solar plants around the world. Last year it completed construction of the US's largest photovoltaic plant in Florida. The company also claims to have the most efficient solar panels available on the market today.

Yet SunPower's biggest accomplishment still lies ahead. In a few years, the company plans to erect its most massive solar power plant yet, the 250-megawatt California Valley Solar Ranch - producing ten times more energy than the Florida plant - in a sunny valley east of San Luis Obispo. The 6.7-square-mile project, which Blue said should qualify for a treasury grant covering 30 percent of its costs, will go before a county vote in January and, once approved, take up to three years to build.

Solar Millennium, meanwhile, is planning a solar thermal plant that surpasses both the California Valley Solar Ranch and BrightSource's Ivanpah project. If completed as proposed, the eleven-square-mile plant in Blythe, California, near the Arizona border, will be the largest solar plant of any type ever built, both in size and energy production. Solar Millennium, a subsidiary of a Germany-based corporation, will sell the plant's 1,000 megawatts of output, enough to power approximately 300,000 homes, to Southern California Edison. The $6 billion project, which was approved by the California Energy Commission in late October and features Chevron as a leading partner, could be online by the middle of 2013.

Adjacent to the Blythe site, FirstSolar has already installed a 21-megawatt plant of its own. The company is also planning to join SunPower in San Louis Obispo County with a 500-megawatt plant that is still in the environmental review stage; spokesperson Alan Bernheimer said he expects the county to issue a final ruling sometime next year. In addition to three more California projects - including one adjacent to BrightSource's in the Ivanpah Valley - the company is planning six out-of-state projects: three in Nevada, two in New Mexico, and one in Arizona. Together, they'll produce more than two gigawatts of power.

FirstSolar plants, which are designed to last 25 years, use photovoltaic solar technology. Bernheimer said the company's extensive project list makes it the largest developer of PV projects in the country. Its panels are the cheapest on the market, he noted, and boast an energy-payback time of eight months. They're produced in Ohio, Malaysia, and Germany, with the latter country providing the bulk of the company's business to date.

BrightSource, meanwhile, says it's actively developing more than four gigawatts of solar thermal power at nine plants on public and private land throughout the Southwest. The company is backed by Google, Morgan Stanley, Chevron, and BP, and helmed by 45-year-old Oakland resident John Wollard, who first encountered BrightSource while working as a green-energy venture capitalist.

No project by any of these East Bay companies has escaped the environmental gauntlet unscathed, and it's a given that FirstSolar will run into resistance of its own when it tries to develop its Stateline project next to BrightSource's in the Ivanpah Valley. Environmental concerns have dogged BrightSource's project since it was first proposed there in 2007, and upon the project's completion, the company expects to have spent at least $34 million on managing them. FirstSolar's plant is proposed to have a significantly larger footprint than BrightSource's, and with a project border only a quarter mile away on the same side of the highway, it's certain to run into many of the same issues. In a way, the ongoing drama in the Ivanpah Valley has become a microcosm of the wider struggle between solar power development and desert conservation.

The battle for the desert can be curiously complex, involving an array of natural resources. BrightSource's dry-cooled, closed-loop system will use water only to wash its mirrors: one hundred acre-feet a year, enough to supply 200 homes, all drawn from underground aquifers. The company also took steps to reduce its impact on slow-growing desert plants. Mirrors will be mounted on pillars rather than concrete blocks to reduce ground impacts, vegetation surrounding the mirrors will be trimmed to eighteen inches rather than bulldozed, and species of special concern will be dug up in their natural soil and transported off-site. Meanwhile, Wachs said, grading for roads will be kept at a bare minimum. These steps will also reduce damage to fragile living desert topsoils, some of which are thousands of years old and capable of carbon sequestration equal to that of a temperate forest. However, they'll likely be heavily impacted at less sensitive sites.

But no concern rivals the desert tortoise. From 1996 through 2009, the species was among the top recipients of state and federal funds to help endangered species. During those years, $145 million was spent on the reptile, US Fish & Wildlife Services records show - more than was spent on the grizzly bear, the gray wolf, and the bald eagle. Of that amount, $26 million came just last year. And these figures don't include the cost of purchasing land for mitigation, which is a major expense whenever development takes place in the tortoise's habitat. These shy, sensitive animals, which spend most of their lives underground, can die if handled improperly and are highly susceptible to environmental stresses - yet live up to one hundred years in the wild. They've arguably become the California desert's marquee species.

The Ivanpah site is not included in any of the Bureau of Land Management's special tortoise management zones, and has seen occasional off-road vehicle use and light cattle grazing. But the land still provides important tortoise habitat that conservationists will fight tooth and nail to protect, as BrightSource learned early on in the process.

The company's initial proposal for an 11-square-mile site featuring 7 towers was quickly downgraded to a 6.3-square-mile site. Later, it was trimmed another 12 percent to appease several environmental groups who identified the north end of the site as home to particularly rich biodiversity, including a wide range of plant species and high numbers of tortoise. The final design employs 170,000 sun-tracking mirrors, or heliostats, to focus heat on three 459-foot towers topped with water-filled boilers. The resultant steam drives turbines that generate electricity before being cycled back through the system.

In June 2009, midway through the review process, the Sierra Club attempted to halt the project because of its impact on the desert tortoise. The organization requested that the solar panels be moved downhill and closer to the highway, with the uplands reserved as an area of permanent protection. But the California Energy Commission rejected the Sierra Club's proposal on the grounds that it "would not reduce impacts in comparison with the proposed site."

More opposition came later from the Center for Biological Diversity, which threatened to sue the company on the basis of "unacceptable impacts to endangered desert tortoise." Within hours of the organization's deadline to file, and after more than a month of negotiations, it reached a deal with BrightSource. Kieran Suckling, the center's co-founder and executive director, said the agreement should preserve at least 100,000 acres, or 156 square miles, for tortoise habitat - above and beyond the mitigation required by the federal government, which typically specifies a 2:1 or 3:1 ratio of mitigation lands to site acreage. Few of those acres have yet been identified, but the goal is to secure contiguous, high-quality land as close to the site as possible.

"It's going to pretty dramatically increase protection for the desert tortoise," said Suckling. "In this case, because BrightSource had already got the go-ahead at this location, which is not a good location, we had to work the other side of the equation, which was mitigation."

On the Bureau of Land Management's tortoise habitat scale of one to three, one being the most valuable, Ivanpah rates a three, representing ten to twenty tortoises per square mile. Initial surveys in 2007 at BrightSource's Ivanpah site identified only seventeen tortoises across the entire site, a surprisingly low number. Yet three years later, just prior to groundbreaking, the company counted 23 tortoises in the 1.4-square-mile first phase alone, calling into question the accuracy of earlier surveys on whose basis the project was permitted. The company has permission to move only 38 tortoises, so if the remaining two phases turn up more than fifteen tortoises, approving agencies will have to reexamine the project's scope.

Ultimately, when everything was finalized with the project's design and all permits were in, BrightSource still had those 23 tortoises on its hands. To ensure their safety, the company embarked on an ambitious translocation plan. During the final two weeks of October, the company worked with seventy biologists to identify and move all of the tortoises located within the first phase's fenced-in boundaries. The tortoises were transported by hand, one at a time, to twenty-by-twenty-meter pens, or "nurseries" in the company's parlance, located a half-mile from the site, which are fenced in and protected from ravens with mesh.

Within the pens, the biologists re-created the tortoise's underground burrows, facing them in the same direction, digging them at the same angle to the surface, and even stocking them with scat found in the original burrow. They also took blood samples from the tortoises in order to identify which suffer from a disease called Upper Respiratory Tract Disease, which is often fatal and has decimated tortoise populations, with the intention of quarantining sick animals. The process took two painstaking weeks, BrightSource's Wachs said, and should ultimately leave the tortoises better off. In the spring, healthy animals will be moved to protected mitigation lands adjacent to the project site, where they'll be monitored for three years.

The pains the company took with the translocation weren't lost on environmentalists. When the Army's Fort Irwin expanded two years ago in the Mojave Desert seventy miles east of Ivanpah Valley, personnel airlifted 556 tortoises to public land a few miles away. Of the 158 outfitted with tracking devices, nearly half died, mostly from coyote attacks. Ivanpah project spokesman Eventov uses the Army's carelessness as an example of how not to handle desert tortoises. BrightSource is permitted to kill three a year for three years without receiving any fines, he said, but hopes not to kill a single one.

Yet all the good PR from the carefully orchestrated tortoise roundup took a hit on the project's groundbreaking day in October, three weeks after it received its final permits, when reporters who had been invited by the company discovered a tortoise with a broken shell in the middle of the site. It had been run over by an off-road vehicle, not BrightSource's crew, but the finding didn't bode well: The tortoise problem just wouldn't go away.

Kim Delfino, California program director for Defenders of Wildlife, says she's most worried about cumulative impacts on the desert tortoise in the Ivanpah Valley. Together with FirstSolar's 8.5-square-mile StateLine plant, BrightSource's project represents the loss of valuable high-elevation desert tortoise habitat, which is of special importance given the anticipated impacts of climate change. If it's not currently a prime spot, it will be soon, said Delfino, as tortoises seek cooler temperatures at higher elevations. But by then there may be little habitat left in the valley.

When it comes to finding land for solar projects, developers look for three things: sunlight, level terrain, and access to the power grid via transmission lines. Conservationists recognize that without these three components, utility-scale solar power plants won't get built, but many argue that the condition of the land itself is even more critical. They want the Bureau of Land Management to limit utility-scale solar plants to previously degraded lands. Thus far, however, the agency has made it clear that it's willing to listen to almost any proposal.

Both sides agree that current siting standards are minimal, at least on the front end. When looking at Bureau of Land Management land, developers need only steer clear of a small number of designated conservation areas. Beyond that, the field is wide open. Even "Desert Wildlife Management Areas," which provide critical habitat for desert tortoises, are on the table - though surface disturbance is limited to 1 percent of the total area, and development of those areas is likely to prove difficult and costly.

Making matters worse, conservationists say, developers are allowed to lead the permitting process. The Bureau of Land Management offers little in the way of direction. The bureau and the Department of Energy have identified four "solar energy study areas" throughout the California desert comprising more than 350,000 acres, or 547 square miles, but companies are by no means compelled to stay within them. Furthermore, the designated areas include plenty of high-quality habitat, and some unprotected Bureau of Land Management lands are just as pristine as those within the Mojave National Preserve, said April Sall, conservation director for Wildlands Conservancy and chair of the California Desert Coalition.

When a company has identified a plot of land it likes, it invests time and money in studying the site: surveying the land, assessing the environment, and measuring sunlight - all without the benefit of any comprehensive plan pertaining to desert resources. If the plot checks out from the business standpoint, the company will try to find a buyer for the power - usually a large utility company like PG&E - and draw up plans and a draft environmental impact statement in hopes of obtaining a permit. The proposal will then be evaluated by both the Bureau of Land Management and the California Energy Commission, pass through two public comment periods plus California Environmental Quality Act and National Environmental Policy Act reviews, and finally seek the Department of the Interior's stamp of approval.

This requires at least eighteen months of round-the-clock work, even for fast-tracked projects.
Developers insist it's a rigorous process designed to reduce environmental impacts, thoroughly vet the best projects, and weed out the worst ones. Yet in the Bureau of Land Management's rush to qualify major projects for federal grants and loans, environmentalists see a fatal flaw. "The tail is wagging the dog," said the Center for Biological Diversity's Kieran Suckling, "and they're just running around following the developers."

Suckling joins Sall in calling for a system based on avoidance rather than mitigation. That means siting projects on low-quality lands such as old agricultural plots, strips adjacent to highways, and otherwise trashed and non-restorable sites. "There are hundreds of thousands of acres of disturbed lands that are already available for solar," Sall said. "If this was truly about saving the environment and responsible renewable energy development, then companies should be interested in developing more appropriate sites." As far as she's concerned, however, not a single large-scale solar project has yet been proposed on suitably degraded public lands.

Ileene Anderson, biologist and public lands deserts director for the Center for Biological Diversity, feels similarly: "When we saw this wall of projects that were encroaching on public lands that were undisturbed, we asked the developers if they could move their projects onto disturbed private lands." What she heard in response, she said, was resounding silence.

The reason lies at the bottom line. "A lot of the siting is more dependent on economic factors," said the Bureau of Land Management's Pogacnik. And perhaps the most important economic factor is the proximity of suitable transmission lines, which are in relatively limited supply throughout the state and can be extremely expensive and time-consuming to build. Transmission-line costs can in fact outweigh the cost of the plant itself. That's why FirstSolar and BrightSource chose to build in the Ivanpah Valley, even if its habitat is relatively intact: Transmission lines literally loom over both sites. And that saves money. Granted, the financial motive works both ways: Environmental management and mitigation costs can make sensitive and unspoiled lands far more costly to develop. The result is a messy push-and-pull.

A massive document called the Solar Energy Development Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement was supposed to solve all this. The Bureau of Land Management and Department of Energy have been touting it since May 2008, and in June 2009 the former agency's Acting State Director Jim Abbott promised it to the House Natural Resources Committee by the end of the year. Nearly a year past his deadline, it still hasn't been released - though word is it will finally be available around December 15.

The document should provide developers and environmentalists a hefty 10,000 pages of guidance, including detailed maps showing where and where not to develop, plus preliminary site-specific environmental analyses. The report will ban development in some of the most environmentally sensitive areas while calling attention to degraded lands that are ideal for solar development. By the time it finally arrives, however, it'll be too late to alter the courses of the country's first generation of large-scale solar power plants.

The report also won't make up for the extensive gaps in our knowledge of desert ecosystems. "We never know if we've made the right decisions today based on what the environment's going to give us in the next thirty years," said Pogacnik. This applies to siting as much as to mitigation; populations move around, and the brief snapshots provided by environmental impact reports and pre-construction survey aren't necessarily accurate; they're just the best information available at the time. This is why, said Pogacnik, all mitigation efforts and environmental concerns such as wildlife populations and erosion at plant sites will be monitored on an ongoing basis. Yet mistakes made in a slow-moving ecosystem like the desert can have permanent effects.

It wasn't long ago that popular culture regarded the desert as an environmental wasteland, and our familiarity with many of its denizens remains relatively cursory. According to Anderson, four rare plants were identified at the BrightSource Ivanpah location that no one previously knew were there. On the site of a 664-megawatt Tessera project called Calico in the Mojave Desert, a survey turned up a greater density of desert tortoise than in designated conservation areas, plus a new plant species undescribed by science. At another proposed Tessera project site, a new population of endangered bighorn sheep was discovered.

Then there was the Solar Millennium site called Ridgecrest that was known to provide valuable habitat to the state-listed Mojave ground squirrel, found only in the western part of the desert. Solar Millennium had proposed half of its site on a Mojave ground squirrel conservation area, and instead of doing preliminary studies, was prepared to heavily mitigate its impacts on the squirrel. However, when surveys were finally conducted, a large, healthy, and "biologically picture-perfect" population of desert tortoise was discovered, Anderson said. For these reasons, the California Energy Commission denied the company's application; it's currently on hiatus, but not cancelled.

Anderson's colleague Kieran Suckling, meanwhile, has set his sights on another Solar Millennium project: Blythe, the 7,000-acre leviathan planned for Riverside County. Its siting is even worse than BrightSource's Ivanpah project, Suckling said, and environmental discoveries made there could be even more game-changing. "Blythe is a real problem," he said. "It's gonna run into a juggernaut of opposition."

From the perspective of environmentalists, the current outlook offers little in the way of practical solutions. For now, they've placed their hope in the Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement to provide developers strict guidelines on where to develop and where to avoid - what Sall called "solar goal areas" and "solar exclusionary areas."

In its absence, however, a coalition of ten environmental groups has drafted its own siting criteria and a detailed map identifying proposed new solar energy study areas. The map includes a total of 103 square miles on public land and another 211 privately owned. According to Sall, the Wildlands Conservancy has submitted the map to the Bureau of Land Management for consideration and discussed it individually with all of the major solar companies. However, the Bureau of Land Management has yet to adopt any official siting criteria, and none of the companies has adopted their recommendations, Sall said.

Senator Dianne Feinstein, a longtime champion of the desert who helped establish Death Valley National Park, Joshua Tree National Park, and the Mojave National Preserve with her 1994 Desert Protection Act, has also gotten involved. She recently authored the California Desert Protection Act of 2010, which would set aside more than one million additional acres for conservation as well as streamline the process for evaluating solar energy proposals by fast-tracking only those sited on private land or disturbed public land, effectively leaving those proposed for pristine public lands out in the cold.

The bill has the support of Southern California Edison, the country's largest purchaser of renewable energy, but is currently tied up in limbo after a Senate hearing in May. Spokesman Tom Mentzer said the bill is still a priority for Senator Feinstein, and that her staff is actively seeking ways to push it through.

As these environmental issues slowly work themselves out, solar companies like BrightSource, FirstSolar, Solar Millennium, and SunPower will continue doing what they do best: supplying as much solar power as they can to our nation's energy grid - not only to survive as for-profit businesses, but also to help ease our dependence on non-renewable and greenhouse gas-generating power. "All of the companies that are doing renewable energy projects believe that they're doing something good," said Defenders of Wildlife's Kim Delfino, who has been critical of solar development procedures to date. "This has been a learning experience for everybody."