usafaux2004
Member
Hey all.
I moved to the US when I was 11. Prior to that, I used to troll the woods, and found many frogs/lizards/snakes/newts/salamanders.
Most of the salamanders/newts were small, maybe 3 inches long (not too different from Eastern Newts here). But this one time I visited an old Soviet town/base: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skrunda-1
There, in an old flooded concrete sewer pipe (not actually leading to a sewer), I found quite a few of the little lighter colored newts, as well as 2 of what the locals colladed "King Newts". They were quite large compared to the others I was familiar with. They were maybe 5-6 inches long, and black. I honestly don't remember them having ANY spots. Until recently, I also didn't realize I was poisoned by them. When leaving the town (and releasing them of course before hand), I had quite the nausea/headache. Only recently did I put two and two together to realize it was probably from handling them so much and not washing my hands.
I've done many searches for pictures of European newts/salamanders, but I've NEVER found one that didn't have spots. There's a black one with wart-like structures, but these were nice and smooth.
I moved to the US when I was 11. Prior to that, I used to troll the woods, and found many frogs/lizards/snakes/newts/salamanders.
Most of the salamanders/newts were small, maybe 3 inches long (not too different from Eastern Newts here). But this one time I visited an old Soviet town/base: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skrunda-1
There, in an old flooded concrete sewer pipe (not actually leading to a sewer), I found quite a few of the little lighter colored newts, as well as 2 of what the locals colladed "King Newts". They were quite large compared to the others I was familiar with. They were maybe 5-6 inches long, and black. I honestly don't remember them having ANY spots. Until recently, I also didn't realize I was poisoned by them. When leaving the town (and releasing them of course before hand), I had quite the nausea/headache. Only recently did I put two and two together to realize it was probably from handling them so much and not washing my hands.
I've done many searches for pictures of European newts/salamanders, but I've NEVER found one that didn't have spots. There's a black one with wart-like structures, but these were nice and smooth.