The Herpetological Journal

pp.137-142

Authors: Robert Jehle

Abstract: '.hirty great crested newts (Triturus cristatus) and 25 marbled newts (T. marmoratus) were rad 10 tracked for up to 31 days after leaving breeding ponds in western France. Around the pond where most newts were radio-tracked, 95% of all summer refuges fell within a radius from the pond of 63.0 m for T. cristatus and 59.5 m for T. marmoratus. The most frequently used habitats were directly adjacent to the pond shoreline. For the other two ponds, all summer refuges fell within radii of between 26.2 m and 32.3 m from the ponds respectively. No significant differences among species or ponds were observed in the mean distance that newts moved away from the breeding site. Five radio-tracked T. cristatus and two radio-tracked T. marmoratus that were moved back into their ponds migrated during the following night in almost identical directions to their initial emigrations, but did not return to the original refuges. Jn eight cases, several (up to ten) untracked newts were found in the refuges of radio-tracked individuals.

Keywords: radio-tracking, terrestrial summer habitat, site fidelity, Triturus cristatus, T. marmoratus