Acoustic orientation in the palmate newt, Lissotriton helveticus

Rural road networks as barriers to gene flow for amphibians: Species-dependent mitigation by traffic calming

“…Amphibian road mortality seems to be associated to traffic intensity, more clearly in Anurans than in salamanders (Mazerolle, 2004). The high site fidelity of amphibians (their phylopatry for the breeding pond), well documented for many species (Diego-Rasilla & Luengo, 2007;Joly & Miaud, 1989;Rowe, Beebee, & Burke, 2000), may enhance mortality because adults move from hibernation to native breeding sites (Hels & Buchwald, 2001). Although substitute breeding ponds can be progressively adopted at least by some species like Bufo bufo (Schlupp & Podloucky, 1994), it is clear now that the negative effect of roads is at least as great as the negative effect of deforestation for amphibians (Eigenbrod, Hecnar, & Fahrig, 2008).…”

“…In the last decades amphibians have experienced dramatic declines worldwide and have become a protection target (Beebee & Griffiths, 2005;Stuart et al, 2004). Amphibians are generally poor dispersers (DeMaynadier & Hunter, 2000;Diego-Rasilla & Luengo, 2007;Gibbs, 1998;Joly, Miaud, Lehmann, & Grolet, 2001) and exhibit high costs of locomotion (Bennett & Licht, 1974;Gatten, Miller, & Full, 1992). Therefore landscape features often impact genetic structure of populations by disrupting dispersal patterns (Duellman & Trueb, 1994;Funk et al, 2005;Lynch & Duellman, 1997;Spear, Peterson, Matocq, & Storfer, 2005;Vences & Wake, 2007), although natural obstacles like mountain ridges not always represent significant barriers to gene flow.…”

Evidence of light-dependent magnetic compass orientation in urodele amphibian larvae

“…Previous experiments of palmate newts, Lissotriton helveticus, have also demonstrated that migrating adults use the calls of anurans as a guidance mechanism to locate breeding ponds, particularly for short-distance orientation under an overcast sky (Diego-Rasilla and Luengo, 2007), an ability also demonstrated in adult marbled newts, Triturus marmoratus (Diego- Rasilla and Luengo, 2004), and smooth newts, Lissotriton vulgaris (Pupin et al, 2007). Furthermore, palmate newts are capable of long-distance homing at night using the magnetic compass as the only source of compass information (Diego-Rasilla et al, 2008).…”

Use of a Magnetic Compass for Nocturnal Homing Orientation in the Palmate Newt, Lissotriton helveticus

“…2006), make newts an excellent model for comparison with vertebrates that home over larger spatial scales (e.g., birds and sea turtles). In earlier experiments, it has been shown that migrating palmate newts ( Lissotriton helveticus ) can use the calls of anurans with which they share a breeding pond as reference cues for orientation (Diego‐Rasilla & Luengo 2007). Newts can discriminate the calls of a sympatric anuran species and these calls can help newts to orient towards breeding sites during dispersal and homing to breeding ponds (Diego‐Rasilla & Luengo 2004, 2007; Pupin et al.…”

“…In toads ( Bufo ), the relative importance of different sensory modalities (vision, audition and magnetic) varies considerably in different species (Sinsch 1987, 1990). As the palmate newt is the second urodele amphibian shown to use auditory cues for homing (Diego‐Rasilla & Luengo 2004, 2007), and neither species shown to use auditory cues has been tested for the use of magnetic compass cues, it is interesting to determine whether auditory cues are used instead of magnetic cues in L. helveticus , or whether both auditory and magnetic cues are used for homing, perhaps over different spatial scales.…”