Todd Pusser (SALAMANDER)
VAULT
The Carolina Sandhills Salamander
STREAK of RED Discovered decades ago, the Carolina Sandhills Salamander has recently been proven to be an entirely new species by HAMPTON WILLIAMS HOFER photography by JUSTIN KASE CONDER
“I
thought it was just an oddball,” says Alvin Braswell of the unusual red salamander he first saw in 1969. At the time, he was the assistant curator for lower invertebrates at the North Carolina Museum of Natural 38 | WALTER
Sciences. It looked like a Southern TwoLined Salamander (Eurycea cirrigera), but “the specimen had hardly any stripes, it was different — and it alerted us to pay more attention.” Braswell went on to spend many rainy nights along streams “all over” the Sand-
hills, burrowing through root tangles in search of more of these salamanders. He learned to find them on roadsides, where they tended to move on damp winter nights — little streaks on the asphalt, indistinguishable from pine needles when their heads were down.
