Salamanders

Sorry, don't have much time, have a look now I'll explain after the SATs.

http://before-reality.net/ul/sal1.jpg
http://before-reality.net/ul/sal2.jpg

That's cute, where did you take those? A pet?

wow, cool..

OK! So we get home from shopping yesterday (my mom, my dad, and I), and my dad goes out back to check on a little, maybe 7foot diameter pond we have. Finds out our fish died. Oh well.

Anyways so he discovers this huge, 8" long salamander, and then looks in the water and see's another. So he gets me and my mom to show me, and we now can only spot the one in the water. I went back inside because it was raining and such, but decided to go back out with my camera, to try to take a few photos.

And I'll be damned, there must have been atleast 15 spotted salamanders in our pond. So I managed to get a shot of those two, then I came inside to research. Turns out they were probably laying eggs and such, as they tend to do so the first warm rain of spring. The also lay about 100-200 eggs, so basically, besides the 1000's of tadpoles we had last year, and hopefully will have this year, we also have many spotted salamanders.

Sadly they stay underground

Salamanders are wild, they are not a fish but can swim, they are not terrestrial but can stay out of water for a wile, evolution in the making, think that millions of years ago we where in that stage too! wild!
Which kind is it by the way! “Spotted salamanders” is the name you gave them or is it something else?

Spotted Salamander, Ambystoma maculatum
http://www.npwrc.usgs.gov/narcam/idguide/ambymacu.htm

They look just like the top five pictures there. The frogs are back now too! I love my micro pond

Thx b_heyer for that link, I love those kinds of sites.