THE CENTER FOR NORTH AMERICAN HERPETOLOGY
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Amphibia    Caudata    Plethodontidae  

Blacksburg Salamander
Plethodon jacksoni Newman, 1954
PLEH-tho-don — JAK-son-eye

SSAR 9th Edition Comments:
 Elevated from the synonymy of Plethodon wehrlei by Felix et al. (2019, Zootaxa 4609: 429–448). (Pyron, R. Alexander, Christopher K. Beachy, David A. Beamer, and Kenneth M. Kozak. 2025. Caudata – Salamanders. Pages 10-21 in Kirsten E. Nicholson (Editor), Scientific and Standard English Names of Amphibians and Reptiles of North America North of Mexico, with Comments Regarding Confidence in Our Understanding, 9th Edition. Society for the Study of Amphibians and Reptiles, Lawrence, Kansas. 87 pp.)

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Occurrences:; 167 Total; 29 Museum; 138 Other
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Province/State Distribution:
United States: North Carolina Virginia

Taxonomic Etymology:
Named in honor of a biologist involved in its discovery.
Plethodon — From Greek plethos (πλῆθος), meaning “multitude” or “fullness,” and odōn (ὀδών), meaning “tooth”—“many-toothed,” referring to the numerous vomerine teeth characteristic of the genus.
jacksoni — A patronym honoring David R. Jackson (1907–1971), an Associate Professor of Biology at Virginia Polytechnic Institute (Virginia Tech) who contributed to its discovery and study.

First instance(s) of published English names:
No historic English names have been assigned to this taxon yet.

Taxon Links:

  
Catalog of American Amphibians and Reptiles
  
Amphibian Species of the World
  
NatureServe
  
iNaturalist
  
GenBank
  
USGS - Nonindigenous Aquatic Species Database

Selected References:
1954 Newman, W. B. A new plethodontid slamander from southwestern Virgiania. Herpetologica 10:9–14
1956 Highton, Richard. The relationships of the salamanders of the genus Plethodon. Dissertation. University of Florida, Gainesville. 224pp.
1961 Cochran, Doris M. Type specimens of reptiles and amphibians in the United States National Museum. Bulletin of the United States National Museum (220):1-289
1962 Highton, Richard. Revision of North American salamanders of the genus Plethodon. Bulletin of the Florida State Museum, Biological Sciences 6(3):235-267
1979 Highton, Richard and A. Larson. The genetic relationships of salamanders of the genus Plethodon. Systematic Zoology 28(4):579-599
1979 Maxson, Linda R., Richard Highton, and David B. Wake. Albumin evolution and its phylogenetic implications in the plethodontid salamander genera Plethodon and Ensatina. Copeia 1979(3):502-508
1991 Highton, Richard H. Molecular phylogeny of Plethodonine salamanders and Hylid frogs: Statistical analysis of protein comparisons. Molecular Biology and Evolution 8(6):796-818
1993 Arnold, Steven J., Nancy L. Reagan, and Paul A. Verrell. Reproductive isolation and speciation in plethodontid salamanders. Herpetologica 49(2):216-228
2006 Kozak, Kenneth H., David W. Weisrock, and Allan Larson. Rapid lineage accumulation in a non-adaptive radiation: Phylogenetic analysis of diversification rates in eastern North American woodland salamanders (Plethodontidae: Plethodon). Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 2006(273):539-546
2010 Kozak, Kenneth H. and John J. Wiens. Accelerated rates of climatic-niche evolution underlie rapid species diversification. Ecology Letter 13:1378-1389
2019 Felix, Zachary I., Jessica A. Wooten, Todd W. Pierson, and Carlos D. Camp. Re-evaluation of the Wehrle’s salamander (Plethodon wehrlei Fowler and Dunn) species group (Caudata: Plethodontidae) using genomic data, with the description of a new species. Zootaxa 4609(3):429–448
2026 Waldron, Brian P., Maggie M. Hantak, Emily F. Watts, Josef C. Uyeda, Alan R. Lemmon, Emily Moriarty Lemmon, Robert P. Guralnick, David C. Blackburn, and Shawn R. Kuchta. Phylogenomics of the woodland salamanders (Plethodon): Reticulate evolution and indistinct species boundaries. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 218(2026):108579

THE CENTER FOR NORTH AMERICAN HERPETOLOGY — Accessed: Monday 10 August 2026 02:58 CT