Spring Salamander

Gyrinophilus porphyriticus · Amphibian

Spring Salamander
Northern spring salamander · Peter Paplanus, CC BY 2.0, Wikimedia Commons

A large lungless salamander, 12 to 19 cm long, salmon, pink or reddish, of the cool springs and mountain springs of eastern North America from southern Quebec to northern Alabama; it also lives in streams, karst and caves, and under logs and stones in the woods around. Besides insects, slugs, worms and other small creatures it eats smaller salamanders and their eggs, up to half of what it eats in the mountains of North Carolina, and it eats its own kind. Its larva keeps its gills for up to four years; fish such as the brook trout are its main enemies, and its skin gives off a toxin against predators.

Danger
Harmless
How it is met
Alone, by night
Size
Tiny
In winter
Active in winter

Where it lives

Temperate Forest, Stream, Spring, Cave

Sources

Open it in Biomes — MGS Toolbox