Every year the residents of Keene, New Hampshire gather and watch the local spotted salamander crossing, allowing the Harris Center for Conservation Education to offer a volunteer training program for the public to see the amphibians crawl out, with protection provided by the volunteers, to look for locations in wetlands to breed. The Harris Center was able to close off certain roads in order to protect the salamanders. However, due to COVID-19, this proposal is being pushed back until next spring. The local government then canceled the road closures due to worries of large crowds, the Governor stated, "Crowds of any size, even outdoors, are simply not safe this year”… “We care about protecting salamanders, but we care about protecting people, too”. Due to no new volunteer training programs for the salamander crossings, the salamanders will not have protection this year, and the government is asking residents to avoid the street's the amphibians will be on, in wet or rainy nights. It is a necessary step to not allow gatherings, but I still worry about the salamanders and hope that they will be safe. They are really cute salamanders and if I was a resident, I would be incredibly disappointed! On the bright side, our friends will not be facing too much traffic, as individuals are staying in doors.
https://www.sentinelsource.com/news/local/public-urged-to-sit-out-keene-salamander-crossings/article_fd09b276-7d48-59da-971f-97866c4b9687.html
- A salamander Crossing Guard, doing their best!
1 comment:
What an interesting story! Hopefully people will avoid those roads on rainy evenings and the salamanders will benefit from this temporary slow down in human activity.
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