The salamander Hunt

Alija Kankam  
 
Mr Pasterino - Env. Science (Period 1​ )

Introduction​: 
My Group had consisted of Ryan D, Ryan F, Brent , Jordy and Greg. My team had went out in
the forest with other 12th grade groups to gather up information about these species called
salamanders. As they started to enter the forest they had to carry these materials to help them
calculate the meters in order to find the salamanders. We are doing this experiment because so
we can see if the TGS campus is healthy or not, so in order to find that out we had to go out in
the woods to see the amount of salamanders we could salvish. Salamanders live in very damp
and tight environments that other species at its size really don't live in. They don't really like to
live in dry weather. Only way that you would be able to find them in dry weather if you look
under things that are damp underneath mostly rocks or near water.

 
Materials ​:  
● 100 meter measuring tape
● 2-foot long piece of rope
● 1 orange plastic steak
● 1 wooden steak

Methods​ :

I had not been there for the walk but I was told that as they walked down some of the
trails that the school has. The groups had to first walk in the woods with a 100 meter tape to help
with the calculations. Then they had to use these wooden steaks to help keep the tape in the
ground, as well as the rope that they had. They also had the orange steak to help but they had to
start the quadrat at 0 meters in the beginning of the whole process. Next one of my group
members that went on the walk told me that they had to plant the rope every 20 meters and do
another quadrat to put down for data.

Results​ :

Species Meters Amount Location

Four toed 20 1(FT) 1 (ER) Found both on pile of

stones and wet leaves

Eastern Redback 40 1 (ER) Found under a giant

log covered in moss

80 2(ER) Found in mud under

pile of twigs
 ​Analysis ​:

My Group member Greg had told me that the Four Toed was one of the hardest species to find in
the woods. The only reasoning on why they are so hard to find because the Eastern Redback are
much more common in the area and perimeter that the school is at. Both of the species had been
found in very wet and very hard to squeeze places. I was told that some of them were found in
piles of leaves and in between rocks. Also they had found some underneath logs that had
consisted of moss and mud.

Shannon diversity index ​:

The Equation: H= ΣPi LnPi

Parts of Equation:
● Ni= Natural Logarithm
● Pi= Proportion of each species
● Σ= sun of
● Ni=

Species NI PI Ln PI Total

Er 5 0.83 -0.18 -0.14

Ft 1 0.16 -1.83 -0.29

In conclusion ​:

In my opinion I feel that the salamanders are easier to find in wet damp places because
that's usually what they are comfortable in, not really dry weather. Also I don't think that the
information that we have gathered can tell if the TGS campus is healthy or not. Also my team
had told me other groups had found different types of species (salamanders). I heard that some
groups had found a large abundance of Eastern Redbacks, but some of them had been four toed
salamanders but mostly it was redbacks. But if the TGS campus is healthy the biodiversity of the
species salamanders would be high.