Hellbender salamanders are in trouble. Their numbers have been declining for decades, and some of their few remaining habitats in Appalachia were damaged during Hurricane Helene in 2024.
But researchers have now made a breakthrough; they’ve successfully removed eggs from damaged streams, kept them alive when they hatched, and returned baby hellbenders to their native water.
“To actually rear those babies in the lab, and have the opportunity to watch them be released into their natal sites, where they came from, was, I mean I’ve got chills right now thinking about it,” recalled Bill Hopkins, a conservation professor at Virginia Tech. “It was a pretty spectacular and special moment in my career."
Hellbenders are North America’s largest salamanders, and used to live throughout the eastern United States.
“Parts of central and southern Appalachia are one of the last strongholds for the species,” Hopkins explained.
In 2024, the Federal Government proposed to list eastern hellbenders as endangered, but that rule has not been finalized, and it’s unclear if or when it might be.
Hopkins said hellbenders are threatened by pollution, especially along creeks where trees have fallen or been removed.
“Because the fathers, who normally take really good care of those babies, don’t do that when water quality is degraded,” said Hopkins, who’s studied the species for nearly 20 years.
“I don’t know that I ever really imagined that we’d get to a point where, one, we understood why the populations were declining, and two, to start designing intervention to try to circumvent those declines.”
The eggs are collected from areas where they likely wouldn’t survive on their own. They hatch in the lab, and when the baby hellbenders are a few months old, they’re released back into the same river or creek they began as eggs.
Hopkins said they plan to scale up the project, which is a partnership with the Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources, to help more hellbenders survive, but it’s a temporary solution.
“So basically, buying time while we try to solve this water quality mystery, and while we try to take actions to improve their habitat,” Hopkins explained.
Salem’s minor-league baseball team is hosting a special hellbender themed night on Friday, June 26.
Hopkins says this is a good opportunity to increase public awareness for Hellbenders. “It’s a way to recognize as a community that we have something really special here and something that we should be proud of and something that we should try to protect,” Hopkins said.
“They’re symbolic of the incredible biodiversity that we have in this region. And in the wake of Hurricane Helene, I think they’re also symbolic of resilience,” Hopkins said.
