The Virginia endemics

Plethodon virginia, the Shenandoah Mountain Salamander.

Brady and Frank just got finished with their 2025 Plethodon Party trip through the Southern Appalachians. Their main goal with the trip was to film for Frank’s upcoming documentary on the Lungless Salamanders of the Appalachians. He is extremely happy with the footage and can’t wait to show you guys once it’s all finished! He will have more filming to do in Maryland and the Virginias this Fall.

As for the trip itself, it was a huge success, with a total of 44 salamander species and 33 lifers for Brady (which exactly doubled his life salamander count). Frank saw everything he felt he needed to include in the documentary, which was incredible. The boys also had the best weather for filming, with clouds in the sky every day and a ground moist enough to bring out the salamanders.

It was truly the trip of a lifetime.

Here is the first species they stopped off for on the way down south on night one, which was surely the night of rain. It seemed the entire trip route was getting soaked, which had them amped up.

Plethodon punctatus, the Cow Knob Salamander.

This was the second species they saw at the first stop of the trip.

What’s very interesting is the relationship between Plethodon virginia & Plethodon punctatus on their home of Shenandoah Mountain.

It’s not crazy to assume the two species would be in competition with one another, given they are both terrestrial species of the same genus, that share the same ridge. If this were the case, though, one of the two species would’ve most likely out-competed the other long before now.

So how do they avoid competition? Well at first glance their habitats are identical, however, Plethodon virginia prefers habitat with deeper soil, while Plethodon punctatus inhabits areas with shallower soil. The other mechanism these species use to avoid competition is staggering their peak activities to different times in the night, helping to avoid any disputes over prey or territory.

Plethodon sherando, the Big Levels Salamander.

After leaving Shenandoah Mountain, the boys stopped off along the Blue Ridge Parkway to photograph these Plethodon cinereus (Eastern Red-backed Salamander) lookalikes. They differ in their longer limbs and larger heads that aid in navigating stone networks.

By the time they arrived at this spot, the rain had really picked up. They were getting absolutely drenched, but welcomed the adverse weather, as they knew it would make for a very productive salamander expedition throughout the week.

The rain was coming down so hard they had to employ the use of an umbrella. Brady held it over Frank while he took photographs and vice versa.

Frank was very happy with this photo given the adverse weather, although he is still in search of a true “stunner” of this species, which are apparently more common amongst the higher elevations in their range that the boys didn’t have time to investigate during their short stop.

After photographing this individual, they continued south, to the namesake mountains of their final target of the night.

Plethodon hubrichti, the Peaks of Otter Salamander.

The boys had a few literal road blocks on the way to their final target of the night, the beautiful, and wildly underrated Plethodon hubrichti.

First, Frank mistakenly entered the wrong location into the GPS, putting them an extra 45 minutes away from the elevations they needed to be at to observe this species. Sorry Brady!

Then they entered the correct pin and were halted about halfway to the spot by a downed tree far too large to budge. It was probably approaching old-growth age class.

They detoured once again and finally arrived to a forest floor crawling with Peaks of Otter Salamanders. It wasn’t until Brady told Frank to look up at the sky to see the sun coming up that he snapped this shot.

They inhabit about a 5 kilometer section of the Blue Ridge Mountains around Sharp Top, Flat Top, and Harkening Hill - The Peaks of Otter.

And with that, the first night of Plethodon Party: Blue Ridge Bonanza was complete. Two soaked herpers, a dripping wet hound dog, and SD cards full of Virginia endemics.