Download the lists of species observed in the Yale Peabody Museum–Beardsley Zoo 2007 Stratford BioBlitz:
Invertebrates [288KB]
Vertebrates [352KB]
Fungi [119KB]
Click here for the free Adobe Reader® needed to open these PDF files.
Around 50 people, including volunteers, Peabody staff, Yale
postdoctoral fellows and Peabody affiliates from at least 6 countries,
participated in one or more of the various teams — taxonomic working
groups or TWGs — that specialized in specific categories: Mycology,
Entomology, Herpetology, Ichthyology, Botany, Ornithology, Mammalogy,
and Invertebrate Zoology. Although it was raining and the nighttime
temperatures were in the 40s (F), the team members were eager and
committed to the cause of tabulating as many species within the town as
possible within 24 hours.
Survey techniques varied by specialty, and included motion-sensitive
cameras, trackway traps, funnel net traps, cover object surveys, light
traps, seining, bird call-back surveys, and good old fashioned
observation, either with the naked eye or binoculars.
Additional work was done at a lab set up at the Beardsley Zoo’s Hanson
Outdoor Education Center, where, among other techniques, microscopes
were used to identify species by counting spider tarsal tufts and
tadpole tooth rows.
In
the end, teams tabulated 729 plant, animal and fungus species within
the town of Stratford in those 24 hours. Highlights include a state
record isopod, 2 Stratford town record amphibians, and several state
listed species. Data on the state-listed species have been submitted to
the Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection’s database,
where they may be useful in mapping the distribution of protected
species.
Representatives of some of the surveyed
species are now available to researchers around the world as vouchers
in the Yale Peabody Museum’s collections. Additionally, tissue samples
collected for many species are now stored in the Museum’s tissue
collection housed within the Peabody–Yale Institute for Biospheric
Studies cryofacility.
Many of the TWGs reported interesting observations. The Ornithology
group observed many species of rallid that were not expected, including
a vagrant Purple Gallinule that was several hundred miles from its
normal distribution area.
The
Mammalogy TWG “photo-captured” a White-tailed Deer (at right) attracted
to a can of tuna, which it apparently ate. This same team also is
responsible for the most unusual amphibian record of the event, a
Spotted Salamander.
Though this amphibian species is
common and expected within Stratford, no other team saw it. This alone
is not unusual. What makes the Spotted Salamander “observation”
interesting is that it was a trackway left on white paper. (Trackway
traps are made from a PVC pipe with paper inside and ink on each end.
Animals walking through the pipe leave footprints on the paper.) This
may be the first time a salamander track has been used in such a survey.
Plans are already underway for a BioBlitz in 2008, with the goal of
collecting data from the same locations to gain a more complete
understanding of the area.
For information on the next Yale Peabody Museum BioBlitz contact:
Gregory Watkins-Colwell
Division of Vertebrate Zoology
203.432.3791
gregory.watkins-colwell@yale.edu
Beardsley Zoo
http://www.beardsleyzoo.org/
Center for Conservation and Biodiversity
& Connecticut State Museum of Natural History
University of Connecticut
http://web.uconn.edu/mnh/bioblitz/
Patuxent Wildlife Research Center
http://www.pwrc.usgs.gov/blitz.html
with links to other BioBlitz sites
Town of Stratford
http://www.townofstratford.com
WildMetro
http://www.wildmetro.org/
