Making sure your animal is captive bred

I see a lot of posts about people going to pet-stores and being told that the newts or salamanders are bred locally by a breeder, but in reality, are mass exported from their home countries, and die. Here are the steps to make sure that your animal you are getting is captive bred

1:What species is it?

Most common pet-store newts and salamanders (Tiger salamander, Chinese fire-belly newt, paddle-tail newt) are easy to find in their native range, at least in breeding season, and are mass exported from their native ranges to be sold to pet-stores for typically less than $20-$30. These species include the following:

Tiger salamander: (Other names include Ambystoma tigrinium, mudpuppy, waterdog, baby dinosaur, axolotl)
Caudata Culture Species Entry - Tiger salamander

Chinese Fire-bellied newt: (Other names include Cynops orientalis Japanese fire-bellied newt, dwarf fire-bellied newt, dwarf newt)
Caudata Culture Species Entry - Cynops orientalis - Chinese firebelly

Eastern newt: (Other names include Notophthalmus viridescens, Red-spotted newt, Central newt, Red-eft, Green newt)
Caudata Culture Species Entry - Notophthalmus viridescens - Eastern Newt

Paddle-tail newt: (Other names include Pachytriton labiatus, Pachytriton granulosus, Pachytriton inexpectus, Giant fire-belly newt)
Caudata Culture Species Entry - Pachytriton - Paddletail

Those are the main species found for sale, and others may pop-up for sale occasionally, and are few and far between. If you see these species, it is likely that they began their lives in the wild and are WC rather than CB. Rather than getting these, get a species that is offered for here, the newts offered for sale on here are CB and you can look at their background and reviews about the newts.

2: How they look

If they look nasty and unhealthy, it is a sign that the pet-store bought a wild stock and they are not acclimated to captivity. Signs to watch out for are as follows:

Cuts
Bruises
Scars
Missing appendages
Unusual coloration
Infections
Staying out of water
Skinny
No feeding response

If any newt acts like this, it is stressed, possibly sick and malnourished, and if it's from a pet-store, most likely WC and not acclimated from being shipped quite literally half-way across the world.

3: How can I help?

You can help by not buying newts and salamanders from pet-stores, and buy them from other enthusiasts on this site and many others. Spread the word about this site, and spread the word not to buy WC amphibians and reptiles from your pet-store

Also, some species are easier to breed than others. The difficulty of breeding them is also a clue, in addition to price. Some species are so hard to breed or so valuable that anyone who bred them would probably not sell them to some pet store, but would just be sharing them with friends/fellow hobbyists and selling them for more than the usual pet store newt price/ for more than a pet store would be willing to pay for a newt. They most likely have put so much work into breeding them that they would have to sell them for more money in order to make a profit. When I first got involved with caudates, I wondered how to tell what animals were cb and not cb. I think pretty much anything other than axies, if you find them in a pet store, are most likely wc. But if anyone knows otherwise, I would love to hear what they know.

I have been breeding T. verrucosus on and off since 2008 (though the last two years I haven't sold any - my female layer died, and this year I didn't get any eggs. But I have a daughter of hers who laid once and a group of two years olds, so that I hope to get back in 'the market' in the next couple of years). I'm the only one I know of that has offered these for sale cb in the US for a while. If anyone knows of other breeders of this species who have bred these and sold them in the US, I'd love to know, I have been curious how many other US breeders there are of this species.

I also wonder how many people have the more uncommon species (pretty much anything besides axies) and raise them and sell them and just have nothing to do with our forum and so we don't know about them.