Alpine newt in pond

[benw]

I found this female Alpine newt (apuanus) in my customers pond today, and judging by the size of her, and the other i found, they are full of eggs.

I found 1 male- no crest as yet but his cloaca was quite swollen, the only suitable place for egg deposition are the mass of decaying beech leaves (fagus) on the bottom of the pond. A few fish are in the pond too, the pond is roughly triangular with sides of about 2 metres.

I saw one male palmate newt too, no doubt others will be arriving soon.

Ben

 

[pesco]

Wow, its a bit early, and temperatures are not very suitable either.
It might be worth to breed them in a tank. As you mentioned there are fish in the pond so I'm pretty sure not many (if any at all!) will survive to morph stage. Finding another pond nearby, one without fish, would be a good idea too, but care should be taken if chemistry of water is right (no pesticides, fertilizers etc.)

 

[benw]

I think they will survive in the pond ok with the fish, especially with the amount of leaves in the pond.
Moving them is not an option with our laws regarding what is concidered an alien species, i may take a pair an put them in a tank and get a few pics at a later date, but for now i will leave them be, last year i saw about 10-12 pairs in the pond, so its not a bad little population.

Ben

 

[JJS]

This may be a stupid question - but could they be overwintering there (rather than having gone to breed)?

 

[louise]

They do look big, don't they? I've got a group I have indoors,and they have been courting each other for the last few weeks. I have a couple of males with impressive crests, and a couple of runty, drab looking males. It's funny to see the tiny runty little ones tail fanning for all they're worth!

 

[benw]

The females are about 5 inches long, the males roughly 3 inches.

I had a pair in a tank for a few weeks last year and raised the resulting eggs, about 20 morhed i think, i released all back in the pond.

A pic of the pond below, it has both palmate and smooth newts in too.

Ben

 

[marco]

Thats beautiful Ben, do you use filtration on the pond or do the plants do all the work?

I think I encounterd a Palmate male last year in my garage, though I thought the only populations in Stockport were the Smooth newt.