90 Charles R. Blem and Leann B. Blem 



March or early April, and ovulation occurs by mid to late May (Fig. 1, 

 Table 3). Birth probably occurs in late July or early August. One female 

 bore young in the lab on 10 August. Mean litter size, as based on the 

 number of fertilized or yolked eggs or young, was 6.0 (range 4-10, 

 N = 24). 



The smallest gravid V. valeriae was 185 mm snout-vent length. 

 Only 6 of the 17 females in this study reached or exceeded this size. Of 

 these, 83% (5/6) possessed enlarged ova or embryos. Mean litter size is 

 6.6 ± 0.8 (N = 5). Ovarian eggs appear to increase in size at about the 

 same time as those of V. striatula, and one female bore four young in 

 the laboratory on 3 August. 



Developmental stages (Table 3) of gravid female V. striatula seemed 

 to conform closely to Zehr's (1962) scheme. In some females there was a 

 small amount of variation in degree of development of embryos, but 

 never more than three stages were present. Although Zehr recognized 37 

 stages, in practice the first 5 stages (pre-blastodisc) are difficult to rec- 

 ognize. Later stages can be recognized with some precision, and in our 

 material, development of embryos confirms the timing of reproduction 

 described above. 



Most of the male V. striatula collected in our study were sexually 

 mature as concluded from convolution of the vasa deferentia and en- 

 largement of the testes. Clark (1964) found that minimum body length of 

 mature males was 142 mm; 69.2% (18/26) of our sample exceeded 164 

 mm (none in the size interval 138-163 mm were collected), and all had 

 convoluted vasa deferentia. Right testes length in mature V. striatula 

 ranged from 5 to 12 mm. No seasonal cycle in testes size could be dem- 

 onstrated as the length of testes varies with snout-vent length, obscuring 

 temporal variations. At least 53.8% (7/ 13) of the male V. valeriae were 

 over 125 mm and appeared to be sexually mature. These had enlarged 

 testes (6-12 mm) and also had convoluted vasa deferentia. 



Food 



Only 19.6% (20/102; 12 V. striatula, 8 V. valeriae) of the Virginia 

 collected in this study contained food. All recognizable items consisted 

 of small pieces of red annelids that we were not able to identify further. 



DISCUSSION 



Clark (1964) published an analysis of an extensive series (324 spec- 

 imens) of V. striatula collected in Brazos County, Texas, and Clark and 

 Fleet (1976) provided ecological data for a population in the same area. 

 Both sites are near the southwestern edge of the species' range (see 

 Conant 1975). Snout-vent lengths and tail lengths of the males in 

 Clark's study differed significantly from those in our study (t = 2.3 and 



