Help With Wild Newt

Just today, my friend was walking with one of her friends and she found a newt by the side of the road (Not injured, but very cold...it is winter after all) walking...veeeery slowly. She thought it might freeze to death and brought it to my house. It was about...thirty eight or so degrees outside. I have no idea why the poor little thing wasn't hibernating.
I happened to have a small cage on hand (One of those two gallon critter keeper things) and we found a rock outside, washed it, put it in the cage and filled the cage mostly with water (The rock was to stand on) and put my fish water dechlorinater in there and let the newt kinda hang out in there...
Later on, we got some aquarium rocks and put those in the bottom, and bought some freeze-dried tubifex worms to give to it....
First off....I joined this forum because I don't know much about newts, and I'm just trying to make sure I'm caring for this newt okay, since I didn't have time to prepare or research beforehand... I've had reptiles before; lizards and snakes, and fish, but never an amphibian, and I only got to fit in about a half hour of research today about them.... and that's for pet newts...this newt is a wild newt, so I don't know if caring for it would be very different from newts from China or Japan ...
Secondly....does the type of newt it is matter when feeding it? I live in Washington, and I have no idea what kind of newt it is, because the only newts I can find on the internet don't look like this newt, or are from a different country. Would any of you know what kind of newt it was from pictures? Here's what it looks like...

And here it is, as compared to my hand....It's pretty small....do you think it could be a young one?

I think that once it warms up outside, I'll probably release it back into the wild, unless it would be better for it to stay with me...but for now, I just want to care for it as best I can until then.
Any information at all regarding my questions would help so much! If you could tell my what kind of newt it is, that would be great, but if you can't, I understand. Thank you for reading this!
~Diana

looks like a taricha to me!

I agree. Have a look at this:
http://www.caudata.org/cc/species/Taricha/T_granulosa.shtml

Wow, thanks! Those newts on the link look exactly like my newt!

The newt was migrating. Newts do not hibernate. This is the time of year when they return to the pond where they were born to breed. If the temperature dips below freezing, they know how to find shelter.

Be sure to keep it as cold as possible, your home is very hot from the newt's point of view. Read the FAQ, which has links to articles about foods, setups, etc.
http://www.caudata.org/cc/faq/faq.shtml

I would suggest that if you are going to return it to the wild, you should do so right away. Put it back, at night, approximately in the area where you found it. If it is kept for any period of time, it could catch germs (especially if you have other amphibians in the house), and these germs could harm other local amphibians. If you keep it any longer, you should plan to keep it permanently (which for a newt can be 20+ years).

Migrating? I always thought that newts hibernated...there was a whole section of a website I was at about how to put newts through hibernation... but then again, you know a lot more about newts than I do, so if you say this newt was migrating, it was migrating.
The newt is in my room, which is usually the coldest room in the house, at about sixty five degrees, maybe fifty if I keep the window open. Should I buy a thermometer to put in the water?
Even just reading that link you gave me, I'm thinking I should probably ditch the freeze-dried food and go get some live earthworms.
There are no other amphibians in my house, but there are fish (Granted, the fish aren't really near the newt)...would anything travel through the air to/from them?
20+ years....for an animal that tiny, that's pretty rare....but also pretty amazing. I've always had a problem with my small animals not living very long, as it's so sad when they die after just a few years...but if newts live that long, I'd gladly keep it for that long.
Thank you so much for providing all this information! I'm glad there are such nice people out there willing to help!

Diana, most salamanders have a life span of that long. It's not rare in caudates.

If you do plan on keeping it, it will probably need a bigger tank. It will aslo need live food. Earthworms, blackworms, small insects, etc.

This time of year, I'm keeping all of my temperate herps around 40F. Caudates can be quite active during the winter, and none of them truly hibernate.

I heard that N. maculosus can get up to 34 years old in captivity (a record)!!!

The bigger the salamander, the longer its lifespan. Giant salamanders can live 50-100 years +.

I read that as well, simply amazing, nature never stops amazing me.

hi, mine love waxworms. and you can get them at petco or petsmart. and loves nightcrawlers cut in small pieces. he eats it like a crocidile.

Wow.... That's pretty awesome. It's just that usually, as animals get smaller, they live a shorter time...for instance, my hamster will only live to be three at most, and my fish won't live very long, either. (And all are bigger than the newt) So I was surprised to learn that newts/salamanders live that long of a time. Very cool.
Waxworms? I think it would be easier to cut up nightcrawlers/earthworms...
Regarding the tank, the critter keeper is intended to be temporary only. I wouldn't even put my goldfish in that thing long-term..
Anyway, thanks for the advice! You're all being very helpful, and I appreciate it a lot!
~Diana

Sorry if my answer seemed curt, sometimes I'm in a hurry. I'll try to make more sense this time

Here are some sites with information about migration in Taricha newts ("Often seen moving in large numbers to breeding sites during breeding season... Breeding migration begins as early as late January, with adult males entering the water as early as early February.")
http://www.californiaherps.com/salamanders/pages/t.rivularis.html
http://amphibiaweb.org/cgi-bin/amphib_query?where-genus=Taricha&where-species=torosa

The word "hibernation" is often used to describe the process of getting a sal/newt cold during the winter in order to induce breeding (either in the wild or in captivity). Even at near-freezing temperatures, however, newts remain awake, and most are still active (just slower) and even able to eat - this does not meet the real definition of hibernation. But the word is used anyway... confusing, I admit.

Oh, okay.. That form of hibernation makes more sense, now.
And...does being colder mean that he'll eat less? I dug up some earthworms today, but he wouldn't have any of it. I thought it was stress, but could it be the cold weather, too? He looks pretty fat/healthy in his tummy, but I'm still worried about his not-eating-....ness. I had an Agama (Medium-small lizard) that I had to force feed when she got sick... is it possible to force-feed a newt, or would that be too dangerous for it? They were very small earthworms, only about an inch long, and were wiggling very temptingly, but he just wasn't interested (He even started walking away..)
If I could get help on this as well, it would be much appreciated (I'd post another topic, but I think this still falls under the title of help with a wild newt)

You didn't dig up the earthworms from a possible fertilized area did you?

Sometimes it takes awhile for newts to acclimate to their new surroundings,give it some time but keep trying as often as you can.It will eat eventually. It is possible to force feed but is dangerous to do and isn't done much.(This is only done when a newt is extremely sick or skinny.) Good Luck, Pete

Thanks for the support!
And...no, I dug the worms from my garden, and the only fertilizer of any kind we put on there is bunny poo from my rabbit. I have been trying to get the little guy to eat, but he just wants to run away and hide when I get anything close to him... I leave things with him sometimes, but I come back and he still hasn't touched them. (So far I've tried earthworms and waxworms with no luck, and freeze-dried whatever they were worms before that.)
It's been two days without him eating, at least (He came to me the day before that)... Does anyone know when it would start to get unhealthy? He's still pretty fat, but I'm worried...

I guess you should just keep trying, when I first got Bart he didn't eat so I gave him a few days and what do you know he ate. Your not alone I was kinda freaking out at the time (just ask people that helped me out on my threads) Don't worry...for now at least.

When I first got my newts, it took them two weeks before they began to eat.
Like Ryan, I was freaking out too. Just keep trying every day.

Well, it's been a week, and even though he still hasn't eaten, I'm going to move him to my 40 gallon (Mostly tall) tank and see if that helps his appetite. Any thoughts on if this would be a bad idea? (I'm worried about it stressing him out more, but I'm gonna have him in that tank eventually anyway, and I thought if he had more space, me might calm down and eat something...)