Neuse River Waterdogs
By: Angie Chiatello, Senior Marketing Coordinator, Cary Office
Recently, NV5’s biologists in North Carolina were excited to capture five Neuse River Waterdogs (NRWD) in Edgecome County, North Carolina, spanning multiple age classes. This follows our team’s discovery this past fall of a NRWD in Franklin County, North Carolina – an area that was previously believed to be unoccupied by NRWD.
Why Is This Exciting?
The Neuse River Waterdog (Necturus lewisi) is an aquatic salamander that is only found in the Tar and Neuse River Basins in North Carolina and was recently proposed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to be listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act due to a substantial loss of habitat and decreased water quality. Not only did our team locate five of the species in one day, the fact that they are of varying ages tells our scientists that the waterdog is reproducing and thriving.
The NRWD grows to nearly a foot in length and is a cousin to the much larger hellbender. Unlike the hellbender, the NRWD has external gills throughout its lifetime. Lacking lungs, waterdogs require clean, flowing water with high levels of dissolved oxygen to survive. As such, they are excellent indicators of stream health.
NV5’s southeastern-based environmental team provides aquatic species surveys, benthic macroinvertebrate surveys, protected species surveys, wildlife inventories, and habitat assessment and conversion plans. Learn more about NV5’s natural resource services here.