Feb 13, 2021 (Saturday) - South Side

Conducted survey of South side from 8:30 am - 1:40 pm. Weather was 49F, cloudy when I started the survey with a little rain as time progressed.

Documented 152 Newts, of which 12 were juveniles. I was able to rescue 2 live newts from the road in the north side while I was making my way to the south section on my bike.

Other documented roadkill: Juvenile Arboreal Salamander.

While making my way to the south side, I did spot 3 dead newts in HTH survey location 1, 1 dead newt in HTH survey location 2 and 3 newts in HTH survey location 3. (did not take a pic)
When I met the HTH team at Survey site 6 and asked them if they found a lot of newts, they said not a lot today. Yesterday was a bumper crop when they found at least 100 live newts in the buckets and a "few" dead newts on the road.

Documented Human Activity:
Cars: 53
Motorcycles: 1
Bikes: 50
Pedestrians: 9
Parked Cars: 7

Notes:
This was my first time patrolling the south section and it is truly the gorgeous but shy cousin of the north side. When Merav mentioned this section is quieter in the traffic and the newt fatality department, I thought I will use that time to do some introspection; find out the meaning of life and all. But the numerous squished newts had other ideas, I am pretty sure, I'll have one of the days in the future where I get to deeply think about my purpose in life, alas that day was not today.

There were a few instances when people asked what I was up to:

1. An elderly couple stopped their car and asked if I was recuing newts. Then the husband proceeded to point out that his wife asks him to stop the car many times so she can get out of the car and carry the newts to the other side. I thanked her for doing that. They had more questions for me, but the traffic backing up caused them to abruptly end the conversation.
2. A few utility workers asked me if I was looking at a lizard and what it is called. One asked me how much money does this gig pay while the other said he saw one inside a sewer hole on the side of the road. I told it, they can swim in water so that newt should be fine.
3. A few bikers while passing by asked me what my count was for today, to which I replied "52". They then asked how many we find every year, to which I replied "about 5000". Then one of them started doing some math in his head and explaining to the other biker how it is possible if you find 50 in a day.

Link to my observations - https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?on=2021-02-13&place_id=any&q=roadkill&user_id=karangattu&verifiable=any

Posted on February 14, 2021 06:12 AM by karangattu