>>I picked up a waterdog the other from the pet store I'm working in, and I was wondering if anyone would be able to tell me which subspecies it would be. >>

It is not possible to determine subspecies of the tiger salamander using larvae. The size of this animal rules it out as a California subspecies (A. t. californiense), which is a protected species. My guess is that it is probably nebulosum, melanostictum, diaboli, or mavortium, all of which may be netted and sold as pets or fish bait.

>>We got in two of them, and they appear to be very obviously male and female, respectively. I bought home the female, because he gills and tail are a little prettier. One has a very obvious hemipenal bulge around his cloaca, and this one doesn't, so I'm assuming male & female, anyway. They're both just about the same size- the male might be 1/2" longer, but I doubt it.>>

Male salamanders do not have hemipenis, the swollen cloaca is indeed a sign of a male, but it is swollen only during the mating season. So, it is possible that the animal you brought home is also a male but not in breeding condition.

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>>Any help would be appreciated.
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>>thanks,
>>Ronnie Nocera

Where you live or where the animal came from would give you a good idea what subspecies it may be. Basically, all of the species of the tigrinum species group are reproductively compatible with one another, so species boundaries are often quite blurry. The California subspecies, since it is isolated geographically from other subspecies, is sometimes considered a distinct species, but that seems to be news to the tiger salamanders themselves. Introduced tiger salamanders breed freely with the California subspecies, so apparently there is no pre- or post- mating isolation mechanism. In fact, the mating behavior of the Eastern tiger salamander and the California subspecies are identical despite millions of years of geographic isolation.

The tiger salamanders of the Great Basin and Rocky Mountains are interesting. The are very different from the Barred, California and Eastern subspecies in adult coloration. They also seem to have evolved a slightly different mating behavior. Where mavortium meets nebulosum, intergradation is limited. Perhaps the hybrids are not as adaptive as either of the parental subspecies (e.g. if their coloration make them more visible to predators) or perhaps the different habitat preferences of mavortium and nebulosum prevent either of them from making deep incursions into one another's range.

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