University of New Orleans ScholarWorks@UNO University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations Dissertations and Theses 5-22-2006 Salamander Mating Behaviors and Their Consequences for Individuals and Populations Dean Croshaw University of New Orleans Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.uno.edu/td Recommended Citation Croshaw, Dean, "Salamander Mating Behaviors and Their Consequences for Individuals and Populations" (2006). University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations. 436. https://scholarworks.uno.edu/td/436 This Dissertation is protected by copyright and/or related rights. It has been brought to you by ScholarWorks@UNO with permission from the rights-holder(s). You are free to use this Dissertation in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s) directly, unless additional rights are indicated by a Creative Commons license in the record and/ or on the work itself. This Dissertation has been accepted for inclusion in University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks@UNO. For more information, please contact [email protected]. SALAMANDER MATING BEHAVIORS AND THEIR CONSEQUENCES FOR INDIVIDUALS AND POPULATIONS A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of the University of New Orleans in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Conservation Biology by Dean A. Croshaw B.A. Earlham College, 1999 M.S. University of Oklahoma, 2001 May 2006 Copyright 2006, Dean A. Croshaw ii Acknowledgements This dissertation could not have been written without the assistance of numerous people. First, I thank Joe Pechmann and Travis Glenn who took me into their labs and provided a place for me to do this research. Whit Gibbons and David Scott similarly allowed me to work at the Savannah River Ecology Laboratory (SREL) and on the Savannah River Site (SRS), using habitats, equipment, infrastructure, and animals that were needed by others as well. Travis Glenn has been especially generous to me, allowing me use of expensive laboratory equipment and supplies. This dissertation has benefited from the comments and criticisms of my advisory committee: Joe Pechmann, Travis Glenn, Whit Gibbons, Jerry Howard, and Steve Johnson. I especially thank David Scott who provided salamander tissue and allowed me to use cattle tanks, enclosures, poles, drift fences, and other supplies. I benefited from the use of drift fences built by Mark Komoroski at Ginger’s Bay. Many others made helpful comments on my ideas: Bobby Fokidis, Karen Kandl, Mark Komoroski, Norm Leonard, Mandy Schable, David Scott, Nikki Thurgate, and Olga Tsyusko. Tim Mousseau reviewed chapter 3. Four researchers provided data and information from other salamander mating system studies for chapter 1: Erika Adams, Adam Jones, Erin Myers, and Kelly Zamudio. At the University of New Orleans (UNO), I thank Mike Adler, Barney Rees, Yvette Stilley, and Candace Timpte for logistical support. Multitudes of people from SREL have helped me by providing facilities, equipment, or materials: Erin Casey, Tom Ciravolo, Larry Bryan, Charlie Davis, Dean Fletcher, Judy Greene, Matt Greene, Marie Hamilton, Bill Hopkins, Deno Karapatakis, Mark Komoroski, Laura Janecek, Ken McLeod, Brian Metts, Jean Mobley, Bob Reed, Julian Singer, Michelle Standora, Lindy Steadman, J.D. Willson, and Chris Winne. The maintenance department provided assistance and cut aluminum poles for field enclosures. Several individuals generously gave up iii their time to assist me in the field: Mark Komoroski, Cris Hagen, Kate Hertweck, Mandy Schable, and especially Jessica Neamon, who worked countless hours on tasks like catching salamanders, sorting hatchlings, and erecting field enclosures. I began work on this dissertation very new to the world of laboratory genetics. I am deeply indebted to Mandy Schable for showing me how to isolate and screen microsatellite primers. Many others, past and present, of the SREL DNA lab have been helpful in a variety of ways and were tolerant of my perhaps too frequent laboratory indiscretions: Chris Comer, Lucy Dueck, Bobby Fokidis, Cris Hagen, Susanne Hauswaldt, Celeste Holz-Schietinger, Jessica Osborne, Alessandra Seccomandi, Amanda Subalusky, Olga Tsyusko, Tracey Tuberville, Arlena Wartell, and Julie Weston. Some DNA lab members deserve special thanks. Maureen Peters helped to screen the microsatellite primers in the first chapter and did much of the genotyping for chapter two. Mandy Schable did the digests, enrichments, and cloning for chapter one. Travis Glenn advised the entire dissertation. Kate Hertweck was a wonderful student who collected data with me for another project. Maureen and Kate deserve special gratitude for being my first research students ever, in that order, hopefully the first of many. I was supported during this work by a Board of Regents Superior Graduate Fellowship from UNO and education program student funding from SREL. Other essential funding was provided by the Environmental Remediation Sciences Division of the Office of Biological and Environmental Research, U.S. Department of Energy through the Financial Assistance Award No. DE-FC09-96SR 18546 to the University of Georgia (UGA) Research Foundation, grants from Sigma Xi and the Society for the Study of Amphibians and Reptiles, the University of New Orleans, and SREL’s DNA lab. The procedures used in this study were approved by the iv Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (UGA), permit number A2003-10024-C2, “Reptile and amphibian research—general field studies” and the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee at UNO (see Appendix). v Table of Contents List of Figures...............................................................................................................................viii List of Tables...................................................................................................................................x Abstract...........................................................................................................................................xi Preface..............................................................................................................................................1 Chapter 1..........................................................................................................................................2 Chapter 2........................................................................................................................................15 Introduction...............................................................................................................................16 Materials and Methods..............................................................................................................19 Results.......................................................................................................................................29 Discussion.................................................................................................................................36 Chapter 3........................................................................................................................................51 Introduction...............................................................................................................................52 Materials and Methods..............................................................................................................56 Results.......................................................................................................................................60 Discussion.................................................................................................................................66 Chapter 4........................................................................................................................................74 Introduction...............................................................................................................................75 Materials and Methods..............................................................................................................80 Results.......................................................................................................................................86 Discussion.................................................................................................................................91 Chapter 5......................................................................................................................................104 Introduction.............................................................................................................................105 vi Materials and Methods............................................................................................................111 Results.....................................................................................................................................116 Discussion...............................................................................................................................125 Appendix......................................................................................................................................139 Vita...............................................................................................................................................141