Committee Chair

Wilson, Thomas P.

Committee Member

Hunt, Nyssa; Qin, Hong

Department

Dept. of Biological and Environmental Sciences

College

College of Arts and Sciences

Publisher

University of Tennessee at Chattanooga

Place of Publication

Chattanooga (Tenn.)

Abstract

Green Salamanders (Aneides aeneus; Cope and Packard 1881) are a secretive and cryptic species of salamander that can be relatively difficult to detect, due to their occupation of arboreal habitats. The incorporation of geospatial tools is critical in developing models that can be used to predict undocumented locations in Tennessee and elsewhere. Locating the species in Tennessee was accomplished through a total of 18 localities and with that, several habitat characteristics were able to be identified including, but not limited to: appropriately shaded and structured rocks, typical fauna co-occurring within the area, and general topography of the area. Of the 91.8% of sites that were deemed to have suitable habitat, 40% of those had positive presence, the remaining 60% is indeterminate for presence at this time as more field visits should be conducted in the future.

Acknowledgments

I want to thank all of those who have supported and encouraged me through this process. I begin by thanking my advisor, Dr. Thomas Wilson for his guidance, encouragement, and his overall trust in my abilities to take on such an ambitious project. He has shown the utmost care and utter investment not only in my project but as my overall person. I also thank Nyssa Hunt, who from the beginning realized my capabilities to grow in the GIS field. She has kept me grounded, caffeinated, and fed. Nyssa has been my rock through this process and has been nothing less than supportive. I am truly grateful for her mentorship and knowledge. I would also like to thank Dr Qin for his time, insight, and expertise as a member of my committee. I thank my sister, Laura Kropat for realizing I had the drive to pursue my master’s degree. She has always known my next actions before I ever had. Without her encouragement and pep talks, I would have never made my childhood dreams become a reality. My fiancé, Ian Lienhard, for putting aside much of his own time and energy. Thank you for all the time spent listening to my antics about salamanders. I would like to recognize the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency and Dustin Thames in particular for his willingness to collaborate and trust in my ability to execute this project. Dr.s Richard Raesly, Jared Studinsky, William Seddon, and Daniel Hocking, all of whom motivated me from my first year at my undergraduate institution to pursue a master’s degree.

Degree

M. A.; A thesis submitted to the faculty of the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of Master of Arts.

Date

8-2023

Subject

Salamanders--Habitat--Tennessee

Keyword

Salamander; Conservation; MaxEnt; GIS; Herpetology; Wildlife

Discipline

Other Animal Sciences

Document Type

Masters theses

DCMI Type

Text

Extent

xii, 65 leaves

Language

English

Rights

http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

License

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/

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