Yellow Spotted Spots.

[psychotic]

I hatched out a bunch of yellow spotted salamanders. However back in the summer our power went out for two weeks during a heat wave and they all died except for these eight who had already morphed.

Anyway, after morphing they were all black with grey sides. But soon started developing their yellow spots. But it's been four months now and their spots seem to have stopped developing. I'm curious as to why only a few have spots all over like most yellow spotted salamanders. However most of them only have spots or their head and/or tails, with none on the body?

Anyone able to shed some light on this for me? Is it normal? Could they be hybrids?

Group Picture:

 

[Coastal Groovin]

That is very normal and just naturally how they are spotted. They are not hybrids. You are just used to seeing ideally colored and spotted salamanders in books and not the great variety nature really gives us.

 

[psychotic]

Thanks. I've caught a lot of these in the wild ever since I was a kid and yet hadn't found ones with hardly any spots. Maybe they hide more or are more likely to be eaten? Kind of neat to see the variety. They eat like little pigs and are growing like weeds. I give them pin head crickets and frozen bloodworms. They eat the worms from a toothpick. They used to be scared to eat from it. But they are braver now. They come out whenever I open their container. Very cute!

 

[Neotenic_Jaymes]

Certain populations of A. maculatum have more or lesser yellow spotting. You can really see the variation in yellow spotting if you hop state to state. Even different populations in the same state may hold a different variety.

 

[psychotic]

A few updated pictures of my babies. I did have eight and for some odd reason two of them died. Since then the other six have been thriving and do not appear to have anything wrong with them. I do have one runty baby. I feed him separately from the others to make sure he gets something to eat.

I only have one fully spotted baby now. There is another one that has a lot of spots too. All the others are almost spotless lol. My favorite is the runt and the one who only has spots on his tail. I will probably end up keeping them and giving the others away once they are a bit bigger.

 

[Steve B]

Are they all in one tank? If so, how big of tank?

 

[psychotic]

Are they all in one tank? If so, how big of tank?

Right now I have them in a 15 quart Sterilite box with small air holes drilled in on each end (it keeps humidity in pretty well). I use eco earth coconut fiber as a substrate with some moss on top of that. Since they haven't been burrowing and just hiding under things It is easy to spot their poop. I just spot clean and then change the whole thing out every couple of weeks.

I will be separating them when they are bigger.

Currently the biggest baby is 2 1/2" nose to tail tip and the smallest is around 2" from nose to tail tip. I have little cork bark pieces and moss for them to hide under but they seem to always stick together no matter where they hide.

They have grown a half inch since I measured them last month.

I feed them frozen blackworms and bloodworms (thawed of course) and pin head crickets. I have a dubia roach colony that has just started to have some babies. I will be introducing them to their diet as well. Hoping they will eat them.

Once they are a bit bigger I'll introduce them to chopped up earth worms.

 

[Neotenic_Jaymes]

My favorite is the runt and the one who only has spots on his tail.

The one with spotting on the tail is amazing. Great looking salamander. The ones I see here have heavy spotting so seeing a salamander with minimal spots is a sight to see.

 

[psychotic]

Updated pictures of the salamanders I have left. Two went to my boyfriend and these last 4 will have a new home very soon. They are now in the 3inch range. The runt as always is a little smaller than the others.