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Siren Lacertina

 

The Greater Siren (Siren lacertina ) was encountered on our first field trip in a trap that had been laid overnight. As the unfortunate prisoner was dumped unceremoniously from the trap into a small plastic container, it immediately became evident that the animal had begun to secrete a highly vicious mucus; probably in an effort to ward us off or make it difficult for itself to be caught.  As it lay placidly in our small reservoir I noticed its color; deep black with tiny, tiny whitish dots. Costal grooves decorated the side of the body and led to a lighter colored underbelly. Tiny arms protruded from under the head near the external, plume-like gills, and the wriggling body ended in a powerful flipper tail. The specimen was surprisingly sized, measuring approximately over 2.5 feet, and had to bend it’s lower body in order to fit into the container (I was not expecting to see a salamander so large). Without warning, the siren began to thrash about… an escape attempt! Hurling its body with abandon at the plastic walls, the siren sprang for freedom as desperate herpetology students tried to subdue it. This made me begin to think from the animal’s perspective… does the siren know it is “captured”? Does it know what capture is: that one entity has exerted power over another entity in order to confine it to a defined space? And what did it expect to achieve upon leaving the container? Was the siren willing to wager that the swampy depths were just a thrust away, or did it simply despise imprisonment so much that it would exchange death for freedom? Are animals capable of suicide, an escape from pain suggested by Camus? Or is some far-fetched form of survival always the basso-continuo in the baroque-esque existence of this siren's song?

We may never know the answers to those questions. What we do know about the greater siren in general is that it is obligitatly paedomorpphic, meaning it retains traits of juvenile  salamanders that allow it to take advantage of an aquatic environment. They can live in fresh water or burrow in the wet soil to retain moisture. Greater sirens are mainly carnivorous, eating small bugs, eggs, and the occasional unsuspecting fish. Sirens lay eggs in small clusters, though it is not known how the eggs are fertilized, and their courtship practices are as illumined as the inside of an upside down cup. Greater Sirens can grow to be over three feet long as they reach adulthood. Our siren was in the adult stage of life, clearly not a juvenile (size was a giveaway) and certainly sexually mature. I am not sure if the siren was a male or female, since salamanders do not display size differences between males and females the way that turtles or mammals do.

What a magnificent and mysterious creature…