724 AMPHIBIA — SALAMANDRID^, 



/. Dorsal band yellowish ; dots brown ; toes short ; body dirty white below ; ex- 

 tralimital ; New York, Pennsylvania to Georgia. . . P. ocHROPHiEus. 



* Plbthodon erytheonotus Green. 



Tlie Red-Backed Salamander. 



Salamandra eryihronota, Green, Stokbk, DeKay, Holbrook, Haslan. 



Salamandra agilis, Sagbb. 



Pleihedon dnereum, TscHUDl. 



Amhiystoma erythronotum, Gray. 



SauropUs, Fitzingkr. 



Spelerpes erijihronotus, Kennicott. 



Plethodon dnerens, Copid. 



Color upon the sides cinereous ; dorsal stripe extending from the occiput 



to the extremit,y of the tail of deep or light red ; head brown above ; lower 



jaw and gtilar region whitish, ventral part of the body light, but not as 



much so as the throat and chin ; sides in alcohol sometimes reddish brown, 



I and dorsal stripe cream colored ; eyes large, black ; head somewhat de- 



1 pressed, scarcely separable from the body ; canthus rostralis none ; costal 



grooves sixteen to nineteen ; caudal furrows about twenty ; cervical fold 



■J indiatinot, its place represented by a white line ; nostrils laterally situated ; 



length, Scinches; tail. If inches; head to cervical fold, 9-16 inch; width of 



head, 7-32 inch. 



Habitat, Nova Scotia, Maine, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, 



South Carolina, Kentucky, Ohio, and Michigan, as far as the northern shore 



of Lake Superior. 

 Fig. 5— Pie- 



""Tou.7r Very common. 



moutk open. 



Haldeman f states that, while Herpetologists have supposed that P. 

 erythro7ioius and cinerews are different sexes of the same species, from their 

 having been so often found associated together, yet he, as a result of careful 

 examination, came to the conclusion they were not. Four cinereus 

 opened by him contained gravid ovaries, and hence were females ; on the 

 other, hand, two erythronotus contained only seminal matter and sperma- 

 tozoa, imperfectly developed. Two others were found, however, with 

 gravid ovaries, hence' we have of the erythronotus both male and female. 

 Prof. Green, however, concluded, after careful revision, that the cinereus 

 was i^robably only an aged individual, in which the dorsal stripe had 

 become obsolete. 



The Eed-backed Salamander is the first of this group seen in spring, 

 having been observed in the middle of April. I found them 

 near Vassar College, in New York State, on April 6, 1878. It oc- 



• Proc. Acad. Nat. S»l. Phil. 1874, page 315. 



t Cope reooguizes three sub-species, erythronotus, cinereus, and dorealis. 



