Reticulated flatwoods salamander

Reticulated flatwoods salamander
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Amphibia
Order: Urodela
Family: Ambystomatidae
Genus: Ambystoma
Species:
A. bishopi
Binomial name
Ambystoma bishopi
Goin [fr], 1950
Synonyms[2]

The reticulated flatwoods salamander (Ambystoma bishopi) is a species of mole salamander, an amphibian in the family Ambystomatidae.[2] The species is native to a small portion of the southeastern coastal plain of the United States in the western panhandle of Florida and extreme southwestern Georgia. The species once occurred in portions of southern Alabama but is now considered extirpated there. Its ecology and life history are nearly identical to its sister species, the frosted flatwoods salamander (A. cingulatum). A. bishopi inhabits seasonally wet pine flatwoods and pine savannas west of the Apalachicola River-Flint River system.[3] The fire ecology of longleaf pine savannas is well-known, but there is less information on natural fire frequencies of wetland habitats in this region.[4] Like the frosted flatwoods salamander, the reticulated flatwoods salamander breeds in ephemeral wetlands with extensive emergent vegetation, probably maintained by summer fires.[5] Wetlands overgrown with woody shrubs are less likely to support breeding populations.[6]

  1. ^ IUCN SSC Amphibian Specialist Group (2022). "Ambystoma bishopi". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. 2022: e.T136128A119000502. doi:10.2305/IUCN.UK.2022-2.RLTS.T136128A119000502.en. Retrieved 22 August 2023.
  2. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference Frost was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. ^ Pauly, Gregory; Piskurek, Oliver; Shaffer, Bradley (2007). "Phylogeographic concordance in the southeastern United States: the flatwoods salamander, Ambystoma cingulatum, as a test case". Molecular Ecology. 16 (2): 415–429. doi:10.1111/j.1365-294X.2006.03149.x. PMID 17217354. S2CID 13339304.
  4. ^ Frost CC (1993). "Presettlement fire regimes in southeastern marshes, peatlands, and swamps". pp. 39-60 In: Cerulean SI, Engstrom RT (editors). (1993). Fire in Wetlands: A Management Perspective. Proceedings of the 19th Tall Timbers Fire Ecology Conference, Tallahassee, FL, November 3–6, 1993.
  5. ^ Bishop DC, Haas CA (2005). "Burning trends and potential negative effects of suppressing wetland fires on flatwoods salamanders" (PDF). Natural Areas Journal. 25: 290–294. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-08-16.
  6. ^ Gorman, TA; Bishop, DC; Haas, CA (2009). "Factors related to occupancy of breeding wetlands by flatwoods salamander larvae" (PDF). Wetlands. 29: 323–329. doi:10.1672/08-155.1. S2CID 25225298. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-09-27.