Torrential rain, temps above fifty, after sunset, and a forest/grassland/marsh - these are the requirements of the Tiger Salamander. To find one? Well, you need a friend willing to share a well-kept secret spot and luck. We had both last night. New to road cruising at night for wild things, I found the irony of it hard to swallow as it sunk in. We were using a car, the very thing that the road was built for, the road that interfered with their habitat and migration, to find one. The numerous cars on this stretch of road were the things that were hitting and killing them and so many frogs and toads that were coming out in the rain. When we found our one, and only, Tiger Salamander (a species we'd never seen before), she'd been hit, but was still alive. Anguished over what to do - kill her so she no longer suffered or get her off the road perchance she'd survive - we chose to remove her from the road. Driving a little more along this stretch, we stopped to photograph a few frogs, but we could not stomach it any longer after a truck smashed a large frog we were admiring. I will treasure forever my friend's generosity, but I will never do that again. As we left, a coyote made an appearance - the trickster - in the marsh where the salamanders lived. Tricksters are known for keeping a secret knowledge and importing it with sometimes harsh means. Usually tricksters in folktales are used to teach humans us how to behave and treat other humans, but in this case, the trickster was speaking about wild things, the more than human world.

Posted on March 31, 2022 09:55 PM by wildreturn