Plethodon cinereus : Red-backed salamander (primary study species)
Eric Liebgold facts: I am currently a Doctoral student at the University of Virginia working with Butch Brodie. I recently received my Masters from the University of Louisiana with Dr. Paul Leberg. My research interests involves questions relating to ecology, genetics, behavior, and conservation. Some of my current research involves genetic population structure and familiarity discrimination in red-backed salamanders, Plethodon cinereus.
Eric Liebgold research questions:
Little is known about the dispersal of amphibians with direct development, including information about the dispersal or lack thereof in juveniles.Laboratory tests (Jaeger et al. 1995) have demonstrated that males of Plethodon cinereus are less aggressive towards familiar juveniles. My article in Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology shows that discriminating familiars has fitness consequences despite familiars not being close kin.I am currenlty interested in the ecological and evoluationary consequences of discriminating kin.
In order to quantify spatial genetic structure in P. cinereus, a 12 x 12 m plot has been established for a mark/recapture study to delineate territories and movements of adults and juveniles of P. cinereus at Mountain Lake Biological Station in the Appalachian Mountains of Virginia. Over 540 P. cinereus were marked and recaptured using fluorescent elastomers (see picture below) during nocturnal surveys and cover object searches over 2 years. Microsatellite DNA analysis is underway to evaluate genetic structure.
I am running enclosure and field experiments at Mountain Lake Biological Station involving juvenile red-backs and adults found under the same cover objects and different ones to experimenatally determine effects of familiarity on movements.
I am also completing some research on social selection and heredity of behaviors in P. cinereus.
The cover story of a recent issue of Behavioral Ecology features an article by my REU, (undergraduate) Alex Roberts, and myself with the cover a photo I took here at MLBS.
Brodie Lab
* denotes undergraduate collaborator.
Roberts, AM* and EB Liebgold. 2008. The effects of percieved mortality risk on habitat selection in Plethodon cinereus, a terrestrial salamander. Behavioral Ecology 19:621-626.
cover photo: Behavioral Ecology Volume 19, Issue 3
Liebgold, EB and RG Jaeger. 2007. Juvenile movements and potential inter-age class associations in redbacked salamanders. Herpetologica 63: 51-55.
Liebgold, EB, PR Cabe, RG Jaeger, and PL Leberg. 2006. Multiple paternity in a salmander with socially monogamous behavior. Molecular Ecology 15: 4153-4160.