What's a Siren?

[michael]

My one local pet shop has some newts they call Siren's. They're really cool looking long newts with only front legs & gills like a larval newt or Axie. They're probably 5 or 6 inches long & brown. I'm just wondering exactly what they are? They want like $16 for them.

Thanks!

 

[jeff]

Sirens are fully a aquatic salamander species similar to olms. You can read more about them here:
http://www.caudata.org/cc/species/Pseudobranchus/Pseudobranchus.shtml
Hope this helps!

 

[michael]

Cool, thanks! That's them.

 

[dot]

Around the Fall of last year there was an influx of Greater Sirens (Siren lacertina) in the herp market. Some people on the forum have Lesser Sirens (Siren intermedia) as well, (myself included.)

However, I was under the impression that Pseudobranchus are extremely rare in the pet market.

 

[peter]

They're probably s. lacertina or s. intermedia; my guess would be they're intermedia, since they've been more commonly seen in pet stores than lacertina. There is a young s. intermedia in a pet store in a nearby town about that size.

http://www.caudata.org/cc/species/Siren/S_lacertina.shtml

http://www.caudata.org/cc/species/Siren/S_intermedia.shtml

They're not related to olms, that would be the Necturus spp. (Proteidae).

 

[jeff]

I wasn't saying that they're related to olms, just that they're both long, slender salamanders that remain neotonic throughout their adult life.

 

[edward]

Juvenile S. intermedia and S. lacertina are very difficult to tell apart so I would not want to count on the fact that what looks to be intermedia really is intermedia.

Ed