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Stanford is building new salamander ponds

by Don Kazak

The population of California tiger salamanders that live in the Stanford hills will have new breeding ponds ready by the winter rains. The university's hope is to have fewer of the small amphibians cross busy Junipero Serra Boulevard to get to Lake Lagunita, where they go to breed during the rainy season.

The university is working to protect the eight-inch-long amphibians by building eight to nine breeding ponds in the hills. The university removed 12,000 native plants from around the site of the future breeding ponds. Those plants will be replanted in mid-October.

"The ponds have to be functioning wetlands" to work as salamander breeding habitat, said Alan Launer, the university biologist.

The new salamander habitats are getting applause from the environmental groups that are often the most critical of Stanford's plans.

"Every effort to create a better habitat is a great idea," said Peter Drekmeier of the Stanford Open Space Alliance. He noted that a previous effort to build upland ponds failed, maybe because the ponds weren't big enough to be an attractive habitat for the salamanders.

"We need to keep experimenting until they work," he said.

Lake Lagunita will remain a salamander breeding habitat, but crossing to it will become safer because of three additional salamander tunnels under Junipero Serra Boulevard. The first tunnel was built in 2001.

"Creating additional habitat is great, as long as Lake Lagunita continues as a habitat, too," said Brian Schmidt, legislative advocate for the Committee for Green Foothills.

"Lake Lagunita is in a terrible location" as a salamander habitat, Launer said. Not only do the salamanders have to cross the road to get there, but the lake itself is surrounded on three sides by student residences.

Beyond safeguarding the salamander's habitat, the federal government will list the salamanders as "threatened" under the 1973 Endangered Species Act. That would give the salamanders additional protection by shielding their habitat from disturbances.

The California tiger salamander is already listed as a "species of special concern" by the state, but a federal listing would enhance its protection.

"It should be listed by next May," said Kassie Siegel, an attorney for the environmental group Center for Biological Diversity. The group has been pushing to have the salamander protected. The federal listing, if it happens next May as expected, will include the Stanford population and similar populations near Sonoma and Santa Barbara.

A California Tiger Salamander Management Zone was created in the Stanford hills five years ago by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, the state Department of Fish and Game, Santa Clara County, and Stanford.

The Stanford population of California tiger salamanders varies greatly between wet and dry years, since little reproduction happens during dry years. Launer said the current population could be down to 750 to 1,000, while estimates in other years have ranged as high as 7,500.

Don Kazak can be e-mailed at dkazak@paweekly.com