The first two weeks of my internship with the Bureau of Land Management’s Rawlins Field Office have held intrigue and excitement via a vast collection of ecosystems comprised of spectacular faunal diversity amongst an awe-inspiring landscape. With spring’s arrival shortly before my own, I have caught the biologists and associated staff’s entrance into their field season as their new projects have begun firing on all cylinders.  With a goal of surveying the herpetofauna located within the boundaries of the RFO, BLM biologists utilize an array of strategies and methods including but not limited to: dip-netting, seining, drift fencing (with associated funnel traps), pit fall traps and point-transect observations.

The High Desert of Wyoming may not be well-advertised as a home for amphibians but present in this habitat are several. Dip netting in the first week of the internship resulted in the catch and observation of Western tiger salamander (Ambystoma mavortium) larvae.  Following such we had dialogue regarding the individual’s life cycle and the possibility that we were observing a neotenic specimen, that is, it had retained its juvenile (larval) characteristics into sexual maturity.  This state, if present, would likely have resulted from environmental pressures associated with less than ideal conditions in the animal’s domain.  In the pictured individual’s case this was a small, isolated detention pool with high turbidity, limited vegetative cover and is a location utilized by grazing cattle for drinking water.  There is presumably, although not definitively, a low level of connectivity between similar bodies of water in this area although other distinct individuals were sampled at this point.

I expect this internship to be an opportunity for continued education and such will allow for perspective gain. Additionally, it will allow for the chance to perform hard sampling on uncommon species in remote regions; the idea of which should be enough to stimulate any scientist or nature enthusiast.  More to come.