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1. Vernal pools do not have fish present in them. Why might this be good for the inhabitants of these pools?
The fish would eat the developing amphibians and insects.
​2. Vernal pools do not always have water in them throughout the whole year. What challenges does this place on those who would live or breathe there?
They must have an alternate life stage that is not aquatic when the pool is dry. They will have to have a rapid development time, so they are fully developed to live on land when the water has disappeared.
​3. The spotted salamander and the marbled salamander are two salamanders found in our region that use vernal pools. They are woodland dwellers and often use the same place for breeding. What danger does urban development present to these creatures?
They could lose their place for breeding and thereby not persist in an area.
​4. By the time the pools dry up, adult salamanders migrate into the nearby woodlands. Salamander breeding often fails.  Give some reasons why.
Rainfall may be inadequate in some years to recharge the groundwater, raise the water table, and form the temporary wetland. A pool may dry up before the larvae metamorphose into adults. Marbled Salamanders breed in the fall, and during especially cold winters the entire pool may freeze and kill all the larvae.
​5. Vernal pools have become a rare form of wildlife habitat around the country and especially in Virginia due to their destruction.  Can you give examples of how they are being destroyed?
Being filled in, drained, logged over, or polluted.  Because they can be great breeding grounds for mosquitoes, people would rather not have them close to where they live. 
​6. The VERNAL POOL SOCIETY OF VIRGINIA is a growing effort to promote these habitats for study and protection, here in the Commonwealth of Virginia. They conduct research and have a vision to find all of the vernal pools in Virginia.  How many do you think have been found, since their efforts for conservation started in 2004?
Over 500 sites in half of Virginia's counties
​7. Vernal pools are important.  Give some reasons why.
Besides serving as essential breeding habitat for certain species of wildlife, including salamanders and frogs (amphibians), the juvenile and adult amphibians associated with vernal pools provide an important food source for small carnivores as well as large game species.  Many amphibian species are pool specific: they must return to the pond in which they were born to breed.  The loss of vernal pools and the critical terrestrial habitat around them leads to local loss of amphibian species, a decrease in biodiversity, and a decline in food available for many other animals that live in these areas.
​8. All vernal pools dry up periodically. Some pools dry out every year, some others only during dry summers.  How can you spot a dried out vernal pool?
Leaves in the pool basin are compacted and gray. There may be water stains on the trunks of trees, indicating previous high water levels.  Dark water stains, moss and algal growth indicate the approximate high water mark on tree trunks. Signs of recent aquatic life may be found on the bottom among the leaves, such as the remains of amphibian egg masses or snail shells. 
​9. Mosquitoes breed in Vernal Pools. The fossil record tells us that mosquitoes have remained unchanged for 40 million years.  This is an indication that the mosquito is near perfect in its design. However, they are pesky and unwanted by humans. Do mosquitoes do any good in the world?
Public health entomologist Grayson Brown says mosquito larvae are very important in aquatic ecology. Many other insects and small fish feed on them and the loss of that food source would cause their numbers to decline as well. Anything that feeds on them, such as game fish, raptorial birds, etc. would in turn suffer too.
​10. Do you think the dragonflies that are bred in Vernal Pools are helpful or harmful to humans?
Dragonflies do not sting or bite. They are pretty helpful for cutting down on insects that are not quite so harmless, on the other hand. Mosquitoes are one such example of dragonfly prey. By helping manage numbers of mosquitoes, dragonflies minimize occurrences of mosquito bites in human beings. Though mosquito bites are usually not a particular danger to people, that isn't true 100 percent of the time. The bites sometimes can be a source of dangerous and infectious disease transmission.
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