Edmonton area resident Chelsea Brown said she was stunned when thousands of western tiger salamanders descended on her childhood home. Brown said to CTV News Edmonton on Sunday the experience felt like an end of the world situation. “It was the craziest thing I've ever seen,” said Brown to CTV News Edmonton. While tiger salamanders are uncommon in the Edmonton area, they can be found in most of central and southern Alberta. When it comes to life cycles for salamanders, they reproduce in the spring and lay their eggs in local bodies of water. After their eggs hatch, the legless larvae feed on invertebrates such as various insects and turn into four-legged animals in August. “They will span out into their surroundings and start to fill their bellies with all types of prey items — basically anything that they can get into their mouths and swallow, they will eat,” said Alberta Conservation Association biologist Kris Kendall to CTV News Edmonton. Although western tiger salamanders are one of Alberta’s most common amphibians, they are rare to see. “They are very secretive,” said Kendall. “They spend a lot of their lives underground.”Kendall said tiger salamanders are often active after dark, so people do not notice them. It became tough for Brown to ignore salamanders after a large herd showed up while she was decorating her parent's house for her daughter’s birthday party in mid-August. “There were salamanders from the front door going all the way to the driveway,” said Brown. “In the lawn, in our rock garden, the neighbour's driveway, across the street, crossing the street, hanging out at the corner, all along the sidewalk going down to the lake here behind me.”Since she did not want them to get run over or eaten by pets, she grabbed an old ice cream bucket, collecting multiple salamanders and bringing them to a nearby lake. However, she said that did not work out. As she came back to her parent's house, she said it was like they did not move. They were where she had picked them up and the same amount. They had created a little party area in the play pool and were splashing around in it. The invasion lasted around two days, with numbers dropping to a handful by the end of the week. Brown admitted she was afraid at first, as she did not know if the salamanders posed a health risk. After talking to several experts, she said she came to the view the incident with greater appreciation. These experts informed her the experience was a cool situation. “It was a once-in-a-lifetime thing,” she said. “Even people that deal with them for a living don't get to experience something like that.”Tiger salamanders are almost done fattening up and migrating to burrowing sites where they will hibernate below the frost line for winter.The Edmonton and Area Land Trust said this is the time of year when salamanders are most likely to be caught in window wells, sump pumps, and buckets. “We actually do get quite a few people who freak out,” said EcoPest Control field supervisor Neil Ritokoski to CTV News Edmonton. “They don’t understand them, so they think it’s something dangerous.”They release a foul-tasting toxin from their skin. If people or pets eat or touch them, Kendall said they will not cause harm. While salamanders might gross some people out, Ritokoski said it should be viewed as a compliment if they visit. They are sensitive to environmental changes and cannot survive in an unhealthy ecosystem like other amphibians. Ritokoski said people should be happy if they find salamanders on their properties. “That's a sign that your yard is a good yard,” he said.
