Town Gives Green Light To Tiger Salamander Study At EPCAL

Tiger salamander were the focus of a  discussion regarding Enterprise Park at Calverton in Riverhead Thursday.

Andy Sabin, president of the South Fork Natural History Museum and Nature Center, came before the town board to request permission to embark on a study at EPCAL of whether or not tiger salamander travel from one pond to another.

Sabin began by describing the SoFo Museum, which aims to educate schoolchildren from “Riverhead to Montauk,” by taking them on nature walks and providing summer camps. The facility, he said, is attached to the Long Pond Greenbelt in Southampton.

Students at the summer camp, Sabin said, study tiger salamanders, which can grow to 13 inches long. In China, aquatic salamander can reach 200 pounds, he said.

Riverhead, Sabin said, has the largest population of tiger salamander in the state of New York, with over 300 found in one EPCAL pond alone. Only three or four have been spotted in Southampton, he said.

“Do you want us to bring some to you?” Riverhead Town Supervisor Sean Walter joked.

Walter said Sabin, an ardent environmentalist, worked with the town as part of the EPCAL subdivision process.

Sabin said he not only funds tiger salamander research but has given out 235 charitable grants to organizations including those for cancer research. The eyes of tiger salamander, he said, can be used for work with cornea transplants.

The reason for his visit to the town board, Sabin said, was to request permission to study whether tiger salamander at EPCAL moved from one pond to another.

Sabin said he would pay for the $50,000 study, which would require him to spend two days at EPCAL this year and two days next year. During that time, Sabin said the goal would be to clip the tails of the tiger salamander to study the DNA, determine how many males and females are located at the site, and to see whether they travel from one pond to another.

Walter said part of one pond was owned by developer Jan Burman; Sabin said Burman was fine with the study.

The study, Sabin assured, had nothing to do with the EPCAL subdivision and would not impede the forward movement of the plan. “I have no problem supporting this development,” Sabin said, adding that the information garnered from the study would benefit the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, too.

Sabin and the board agreed that they did not think a plan to develop grasslands at the EPCAL site was necessary; Sabin said he would speak to the DEC in that regard. “I don’t agree with the DEC,” he said.  “I think we should leave it alone. I’d like to see it stay natural, for the tiger salamanders.”

The board agreed to grant permission for Sabin’s study.

In other EPCAL news, Walter said plans were moving forward for the town to declare lead agency in the environmental review; the environmental impact statement, he said, could take a year.