It is time for another blog and I thought we would take the opportunity to learn about a creature that perhaps you may have never even heard of. It is a rather curious and bizarre looking animals to be sure; lets dive in there and do some exploring and learning!
The curious animal is the Two-Toed Amphiuma ( pronounced: Am-Phi-Uma): Though you often hear it pronounced ( Am-Phu-Ma).
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| Two-Toed Amphiuma. Photo by ME. |
The two-toed amphiuma is neither a snake or eel as it appears to be, but rather, it is a species of salamander. According to Amphibians and Reptiles of the Carolinas and Virginia written by Jeffrey C. Beane, Alvin Braswell, et. al. This salamander is described as "robust" and "eellike." It has "2 pairs of of tiny legs with 2 toes on each foot. The body is uniformly dark brown, dark gray, or black above and lighter gray below."
Pictured below is a two-toed amphiuma and if you look closely, you can see one of its tiny legs with even smaller 2 toes ( hence the name two-toed). There are one-toed amphiumas and three-toed amphiumas too, but only the two-toed is found in NC.
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| Two-toed Amphiuma. Photo by ME. |
As you may be able to guess, these animals are found in the water and spend most of the time there. However, a really neat fact about them is that they have been documented traveling on land, at night, to get to another aquatic habitat during heavy rain storms. They are also known to hide under objects and in burrows on land, but close to water. On one occasion, a friend and I found an amphiuma under a log, curled up near a crayfish burrow. It was rather interesting!
According to Salamanders of the Southeast by Joe Mitchell and Whit Gibbons, "They can survive droughts and dry ponds by aestivating in burrows in the substrate." So, they are primarily aquatic animals that can maneuver and survive on land for a period of time, how cool is that?
A neat fact about these animals is that they are "the longest salamanders in North America. The record total length is more than 45 inches." (Mitchell and Gibbons).
Anyway, amphiumas are mostly active at night in or around swamps, ponds, canals, creeks, and in some cases, ditches among other swampy, mucky habitats.
Here is their range in NC, though it is very possible to find them outside of their range due to the fact that amphiumas can and will sometimes travel overland to other sites. They can be found in Wake County; the one pictured at the very top of this post was.
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| Range of Amphiuma in NC. Photo from herpsofnc.org |
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| Photo by ME. |
As far as what they eat, these animals are predators with rather powerful jaws.
They will eat small turtles, water snakes, other salamanders, crayfish, frogs, and other critters (Mitchell and Gibbons). No one is really sure how they capture their food, though from what I have seen of them in captivity, I imagine they would do something of the sort of ambushing tactics and foraging.
Here I will make an important note. *Amphiumas have powerful jaws with a serious set of teeth and can and will deliver a nasty bite if provoked. Be careful if you decide to handle one* Not trying to scare anyone, these animals will not and do not seek to go after and chase anyone. Just wanting to let you know caution is needed when working with these animals.
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| Two-Toed Amphiuma. Photo by ME. |
Another interesting fact about these salamanders is that "courtships and mating... have not been thoroughly described..." (Mitchell and Gibbons). Meaning, there is still a lot that scientists do not know about these animals. What is understood about their reproduction is that "Females lay strings of 20-200 eggs beneath objects such as logs and other debris in winter and spring, and usually remain coiled around them during incubation." (Mitchell and Gibbons).
Well, that pretty much sums it up for the Two-Toed Amphiuma. Like I wrote earlier, there is still much to be learned about them, and perhaps this post will inspire someone to go conduct a study ;) As always, feel free to ask me any questions you might have.
