Invasive newts in Florida

I like to look at the posts on the Field Herp Forum from time to time. A member posted a retrospective of his herping experiences in Florida (and the tropics). Here's the post:

Field Herp Forum • View topic - 5 Years in Florida: A Retrospective (Part 2) (Warning: contains some pictures of animals killed on the road)

He's got a lot of non-natives posted and, among them, he has shots of what look like P. labiatus and C. orientalis. I could be totally wrong, but that's what they look like to me.

Is it old news that these species might be invasive in Florida? I suppose both could be recent dumps of unwanted animals, which happens all too often, but they must have been living for a fairly extended time out in the wild. Both look fairly healthy, as well.

Either way, I think it's interesting considering the native habitat of these species vs. what most of Florida is like. Even in the north portion of the state, temps regularly get up into the 100s.

the other pics are from species are not of florida?
it isn't good

enricolatiano said:

the other pics are from species are not of florida?
it isn't good

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Only some of them are non-natives, but Florida has a lot.

That is very interesting indeed! I wonder what the water temperatures get up to? I know that my newts (T. Karelinii) have braved water temperatures in the upper 70's before (for short periods of time). But I'm sure florida has higher temps than that. I sometimes wonder just how resilient these newts can be??

Honestly, what hasn't been introduced to Florida?

eldaldo said:

That is very interesting indeed! I wonder what the water temperatures get up to? I know that my newts (T. Karelinii) have braved water temperatures in the upper 70's before (for short periods of time). But I'm sure florida has higher temps than that. I sometimes wonder just how resilient these newts can be??

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I know the European (ex-) Triturus find temps like that in the wild too. When I was a kid hunting newts in Germany, I would find smooth, crested, palmated and alpine newts in small vernal ponds overgrown with Potamogeton and other plants. On warm late spring days, say late April-ish, they would still be in the water and would often sit and court in the shallows on the edge of the pond. Those would have luke-warm water from the sun. It was wam enough for me to stick my feet in and think I was in a bathtub. Of course, toward the bottom further into the pond it would be much colder, and the muddy substrate underneath would be icy cold. But it appeared to me that the newts deliberately sought the warmer shallow water to hang out.

AS for Florida's climate - it's such that I bet anything you drop to the ground can potentially be invasive.

Definitely C/H.oritentalis in that one pair of photos.Really interesting, thanks for sharing! Hopefully, it's nothing established.

There's a difference between non-native (exotic) and invasive. I don't honestly think the nature of salamanders (like their lack of significant overland movement) and their breeding strategy will let them become invasive.

I agree, both Pachytriton and C. orientalis among those shots. I wish he had posted more info about where he found them. (I haven't bothered to read all the comments.)

I've seen other cases of C. orientalis found in the wild in the US. Considering how common they are, it's not altogether surprising.

Yeah, I should have said exotic instead. I think the policy on that forum is to not give out locality information, even for non-natives.

ozarkhellbender said:

Honestly, what hasn't been introduced to Florida?

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So true!

~ By the way, I absolutely LOVED reading that. Great photography and very interesting. You just made my day. Thank you for posting this!