"Road work ahead? Yeah we sure hope it does 🙄"
Old memes aside, in February 2025, staff at Canaan Valley National Wildlife Refuge (CVNWR) in West Virginia broke ground on an applied research project aimed at improving habitat for woodland salamanders and reducing soil erosion on legacy logging roads.
Early explorers to Canaan Valley described it as a wild, nearly impenetrable wilderness with its dense red spruce forests and thick understories of mountain laurel and rhododendron. But if you're as small as a salamander? These forests created moist, mossy understories that supported you and the invertebrates that you eat. This was a haven for the Cheat Mountain salamander (Plethodon nettingi), a threatened species of woodland salamander that is currently only found in five counties in West Virginia. That all changed with the logging boom of the late 1800's to the early 1900's that left Canaan Valley barren.
The forests have since grown back (albeit looking a little different), but scars remain on the landscape in the form of a haphazard network of compacted logging roads. Long since their purpose of transporting lumber has passed, these roads function today as a disruption to groundwater flow through the soil. And for our slimy little friends, the compacted road acts as a barrier preventing them from crossing. Studies conducted by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and other partners have found that these roads are isolating populations of the Cheat Mountain salamander and inhibiting recovery efforts. So the staff at CVNWR are taking action.
Refuge staff began with a site visit to a decommissioned logging road within the Monongahela National Forest. The Forest Service has studied the impacts of decompacting the soil and restoring the natural contour for decades. The site visit revealed that vegetation cover and water infiltration did increase significantly with decompaction. Working with the United States Geological Survey, refuge staff came up with a study design to look at the impacts of decompacting logging roads on terrestrial salamanders.
Refuge staff selected a quarter-mile section of logging road and set up three transects perpendicular to the road to look for salamanders. Using the eastern red-backed salamander (Plethodon cinereus) as a surrogate for the Cheat Mountain salamander, caught salamanders were given individual identification codes so we can track movements of individuals if they are recaptured at a later date. Soil moisture meters and humidity sensors will also record changes in those variables as the project goes on.
In February, refuge staff decommissioned the section of the logging road identified for the study. Staff used an excavator to break up the ground on the surface of the road and removed the berm on the downhill side, restoring the natural contour. Downed trees and woody debris were incorporated into the surface to protect from erosion and provide future habitat for salamanders. The timelapse video below shows the excavator in action. For an audio described version, use this link here, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8VxlsfN-qMI&t=0s.
Over the next five years, refuge staff will monitor movement of salamanders in the study area. Depending on the results, this study could prove to be a useful management tool for other portions of the refuge with salamander populations segmented by old logging roads.
