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Article Excerpt
ABSTRACT -- The occurrence of a small isolated population of gopher frogs at Arnold Air Force Base (Arnold AFB) in Coffee County Tennessee was inferred from the collection of a single specimen on 12 July 1993. Despite continued searches, a second specimen was not forthcoming until almost four years later (1 March 1997). The collection of this latter specimen, found less than 1 km from the first specimen, rekindled interest in the distribution of the gopher frog in Tennessee and prompted an even more intensive and deliberate three-year survey (1998-2000) for breeding sites. The potential breeding sites were surveyed by daytime searches for egg masses, night-time and automated aural surveys of calling males, tadpole surveys, and establishment or maintenance of pit fall or funnel traps associated with drift fences. No evidence of gopher frog breeding activity was found by any of these survey methods, suggesting that if gopher frogs are extant at Arnold AFB, they are exceedingly rare, exceptionally secretive, or breed in an as yet undiscovered or under-surveyed wetland. These musings can not be discounted as mere hopes; calls resembling those of gopher frogs, though not recorded, were heard by several individuals during the survey period. Calls of the elusive gopher frog continue to be reported, the last made during May of 2002 when three biologists reported hearing four calls during a twenty-minute period.
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Gopher frogs (Rana capito) are secretive amphibians that inhabit moist meadows, prairies, woodlands, and pine scrub habitats within the coastal plain ecosystems of North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana (Altig and Lohoefener, 1983; Palis and Fischer, 1997). Suitable habitat for gopher frogs is decreasing, due in part to the intense logging and subsequent development of slash pine plantations in the longleaf pine region of the southeastern coastal states (Bailey, 1991). Throughout their range, gopher frog populations are threatened by habitat loss resulting from conversion of natural forests to pine plantations, destruction of breeding ponds, fire suppression, introduction of fish to breeding ponds, and road mortality (Bailey, 1991; Palis and Fischer, 1997).
Although a strong association exists between gopher frogs and the southeastern coastal plain upland longleaf pine (Pinus palustris) forests, at least two populations exist outside this region. Disjunct populations of R. capito have been reported in Shelby County, Alabama (Bailey, 1991) and Coffee County, Tennessee (Miller and Campbell, 1996). Logging and development are encroaching on the Shelby County, Alabama population; its survival is doubtful (M. Bailey; pers. comm., 1999). Here, we summarize what is known about the gopher frog in Tennessee, report the results of the most recent efforts to locate breeding sites, and comment on the status and potential threats to the survival of this population.
Only two individuals have been found in Tennessee and both of these were collected at Arnold AFB. The nearest known population (Shelby County, Alabama)...
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