The Herpetological Journal

pp. 241-244
Authors: Madden, Neil & Jehle, Robert

Abstract: Aquatic funnel traps are an established technique for the capture of newts. In the United Kingdom they are widely used for commercial surveys of great crested newts (Triturus cristatus) to comply with EU regulations during land developments such as construction activities. The present study demonstrates that widely-used traps constructed from plastic bottles could become replaced by more efficient funnels such as collapsible nylon traps. To achieve this, we followed standard UK survey protocols to systematically compare bottle traps with nylon traps at six ponds with known T. cristatus occurrences in western France. Out of 296 T. cristatus records, nylon traps yielded 79.7% of all captures and 83.3% of all recaptures. Standardized population size class estimates based on capture numbers were equal to or higher using nylon traps than with bottle traps, and nylon traps outperformed bottle traps for more precise population size estimates based on capture-mark-recapture. We suggest that bottle traps could be replaced by nylon traps during standard surveys for aquatic newts in the UK and elsewhere.

Keywords: CRESTED NEWT, AMPHIBIANS, FUNNEL TRAP, TRITURUS CRISTATUS, MONITORING