NOTES ON THE NATURAL HISTORY OF AMBY- 



STOMA JEFFERSONIANUM, A. PUNCTATUM 



AND A. TIGRINUM. 



By Bertram G. Smith. 



In the spring of 1909, while an instructor in Syracuse Uni- 

 versity, I undertook a comparison of the spawn and larval stages 

 of Ambystoma jeffersonianum and A. punctatum, with the 

 object of securing data for the identification of species in these 

 stages, and possibly contributing something of value from a bio- 

 logical point of view. Information as to the specific characteris- 

 tics would at least be of service to any one using the material 

 for embryological or experimental purposes. 



After my departure from Syracuse in the early summer of 

 1909 it became apparent that I would have no opportunity to study 

 these forms again, and since the results of one season's work were 

 necessarily fragmentary and incomplete, the idea of publishing 

 anything on the subject was abandoned. But the recent article 

 of Piersol ('10), dealing with precisely the same problem, studied 

 under remarkably similar faunal conditions, suggests that taken 

 in connection with his paper my own notes may be of some inter- 

 est, since in many respects the two accounts supplement each 

 other. I have added some observations on the habits of the adults, 

 and a few notes on A. tigrinum. 



HABITAT. 



Ambystoma jeffersonianum was studied exclusively in 

 "Branchipus Pond" and its immediate vicinity, about two miles 

 south of the campus of Syracuse University. Ambystoma punc- 

 tatum was studied in the same habitat, and several years before 

 in various ponds about Ann Arbor, Mich. Ambystoma tigrinum 

 has been observed at Ann Arbor ; in the pond on the campus of 

 Lake Forest College at Lake Forest, 111. ; and, rarely, in the pond 

 on "Picnic Point,'' near Madison, Wis. 



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