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Adult, defensive pose,
Contra Costa County |
Adult, Contra Costa County |
Sub-adult, Contra Costa County |
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Sub-adult, Contra Costa County |
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Adult, Contra Costa County |
Adult, and older juvenile (showing light speckling), Contra Costa County |
Young juvenile, Napa County |
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Adult, Contra Costa County, with white defensive secretions on the tail. |
Juvenile, Contra Costa County |
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Adult, Santa Cruz County |
Adult, Sierra Foothills, Tuolumne County |
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Habitat, Contra Costa County |
Habitat, Contra Costa County |
Habitat, Tuolumne County |
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Habitat, Merced County |
A careful look underneath the fallen bark of this dead tree one wet winter afternoon turned up one Arboreal Salamander, two Coast Range Newts, one Yellow-eyed Ensatina, and 12 California Slender Salamanders, illustrating how dead wood and bark on a forest floor is an important microhabitat for salamanders and other wildlife.
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Habitat, San Mateo County |
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Description |
| Size |
| Adult Ensatina measure from 1 1/2 - 3 1/5 inches long ( 3.8 - 8.1 cm) from snout to vent, and 3 - 6 inches (7.5 - 15.5 cm) in total length. |
| Appearance |
A medium-sized plethodontid salamander which breathes through its smooth moist thin skin. The legs are long, and the body is relatively short, with 12 - 13 costal grooves. Nasolabial grooves are present. The tail is rounded and constricted at the base, which will differentiate this salamander from its neighbors. Males have longer, more slender tails than females, and a shorter snout with an enlarged upper lip.
This subspecies is orange-brown to dark brown above, with orange coloring below, on the eyelids, and on the sides of the head, tail and body. Yellow to orange coloring is present on the base of the limbs. Young are dark above, with yellow or orange coloring on the base of the limbs. A bright yellow patch on the eye gives this salamander its common name. |
| Behavior |
| Ensatinas live in relatively cool moist places on land, and stay underground during hot and dry periods where they are able to tolerate considerable dehydration. They are most active on rainy or wet nights when temperatures are moderate. High-altitude populations are also inactive during severe winter weather. When disturbed, this salamander will stand tall in a stiff-legged defensive posture with its back swayed and the tail raised up. Often the salamander will secrete a milky white substance from the tail. This noxious substance repels potential predators. |
| Diet |
| Eats a wide variety of invertebrates. Click here to watch a movie of an Ensatina feeding. |
| Reproduction |
| Breeds mainly in fall and spring, but may also breed throughout the winter. Females lay eggs on land, brooding them under bark or in rotting logs or underground. The young hatch fully formed. |
| Range |
This subspecies of Ensatina is endemic to California, ranging from from near Healdsburg in Sonoma County, south along the east side of the San Francisco Bay to Santa Cruz County. A separate population occurs in the foothills of the central Sierra Nevada mountains. Yellow-eyed Ensatina were probably distributed from the Bay Area across the central valley when the climate there was cooler and moister, but as it became drier, two separate populations were formed.
The species Ensatina is found in an isolated location in the mountains of Baja California and along the extreme northwest coast of Baja California, north through California circling the central valley, in the Cascades Mountains and west of the mountains in Oregon and Washington, on Vancouver Island, and along the coast of southern British Columbia. |
| Habitat |
| Inhabits moist shaded evergreen and deciduous forests and oak woodlands, mixed grassland, and chaparral. Found under rocks, logs, other debris, especially bark that has peeled off and fallen beside logs and trees. Most common where there is a lot of coarse woody debris on the forest foor. In dry or very cold weather, stays inside moist logs, animal burrows, under roots, woodrat nests, under rocks. |
| Taxonomic Notes |
| Hybridizes with E. e. platensis in the Sierra Nevada foothills. Ensatina eschscholtzii is typically treated as a "ring" species, consisting of 7 subspecies: E. e. croceater, E. e. eschscholtzii, E. e. klauberi, E. e. oregonensis, E. e. picta, E. e. platensis, and E. e. xanthoptica, which ring the Central Valley, but do not interbreed where the rings overlap in Southern California (and possibly in the central Sierra Nevada.) Some researchers see Ensatina eschscholtzii as two or more species forming a superspecies complex, recognizing E. e. klauberi, found at the southern end of the ring, as a separate species - Ensatina klauberi. |
| Conservation Issues (Conservation Status) |
| None |
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Taxonomy |
| Family |
Plethodontidae |
Lungless Salamanders |
| Genus |
Ensatina |
Ensatinas |
| Species |
Eschscholtzii |
Ensatina |
Subspecies
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xanthoptica |
Yellow-eyed Ensatina |
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Original Description |
Ensatina eschscholtzii - Gray, 1850 - Cat. Spec. Amph. Coll. Brit. Mus., Batr. Grad., p. 48
Ensatina eschscholtzii xanthoptica - Stebbins, 1949 - Univ. California Publ. Zool., Vol. 48, No. 6, p. 407, pl. 11, figs. 2 and 12
from Original Description Citations for the Reptiles and Amphibians of North America © Ellin Beltz
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Meaning of the Scientific Name |
Ensatina: Latin - sword shaped/similar to, possibly referring to the teeth.
eschscholtzii: honors Johann F. Eschscholtz.
xanthoptica: Greek - yellow eye.
from Scientific and Common Names of the Reptiles and Amphibians of North America - Explained © Ellin Beltz
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Alternate Names |
None
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Related California Salamanders |
Large-blotched Ensatina
Monterey Ensatina
Oregon Ensatina
Painted Ensatina
Sierra Nevada Ensatina
Yellow-blotched Ensatina
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More Information and References |
Natureserve Explorer
California Dept. of Fish and Game
AmphibiaWeb
Speciation in Progress
Stebbins, Robert C. A Field Guide to Western Reptiles and Amphibians. 3rd Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2003.
Behler, John L., & F. Wayne King. The Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Reptiles and Amphibians. Alfred A. Knopf, 1992.
Bishop, Sherman C. Handbook of Salamanders. Cornell University Press, 1943.
Petranka, James W. Salamanders of the United States and Canada. Smithsonian Institution, 1998.
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The following status listings come from the Special Animals List which is published several times each year by the California Department of Fish and Game.
This salamander is not included on the Special Animals List, which indicates that there are no significant conservation concerns for it in California.
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Organization
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Status Listing
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| U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA) |
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| California Endangered Species Act (CESA) |
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| California Department of Fish and Game |
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| Bureau of Land Management |
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| USDA Forest Service |
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| Natureserve Global Conservation Status Ranks |
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World Conservation Union - IUCN Red List
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