Amy's Field Seasons 2007-2008: Day 26

So my advisor was down last night and today to visit and check up on me (i.e., my boss making sure I'm doing my job). My technicians did a good job of defending my work thusfar! He was mostly pleased with everything- we'll have to move a few points and re-save them into the GPS units since what I have is not accurate enough. He did help us with some habitat sampling problems we were having in areas that we too small or too steep to sample appropriately. Anyway, apparently the solution to that is to just shrink the plots, which means we still have to climb the slopes. I fell a bunch of times today while we were doing some habitat stuff- once was about 15 feet down a cliff on top of Lupita, haha. Good thing it was funny and no one was hurt!

So a few people have asked me for more information about the coverboard surveys. Basically, all a coverboard is is a rough sawn piece of wood (about 1" x 2" in size and 2" thick). These are placed in small groups (for my study its 6 boards to a group) in areas that we want to sample. Really, they are best for long-term studies since the longer they sit in the woods, the better artificial cover they provide for salamanders. Most salamanders hang out under cover objects and will only come out to forage when the soil is very wet (since they breath through their skin they can suffocate if their skin dries out). Also, many species are very territorial, so only 1 salamander may inhabit each board. Anyway, once the soil under the boards gets moist and cool, it will be great habitat for salamanders! I know what I do is kind of different, so if you ever have any questions, post them on here or email me and I'd be happy to answer them!