Description
This newt is usually 9 - 14 cm (3.5 - 5.5 in.) long and can be distinguished from its Chinese relative by its larger size, rough, pebbly skin and distinct parotoid glands. They are typically brown to black above, often with red specks or spots, and orange to crimson below, usually with a blotched darker pattern. Males can be distinguished from females by their swollen cloacas, and male newts of this species will often become a blue iridescent sheen and smoother skin during the breeding season.
In the wild this species of newt lives on the islands of Honshū, Shikoku, and Kyūshū. It lives in clear, cool bodies of water, usually ponds, ditches, pools, or lakes. There are reportedly six subspecies or races found through the Japanese islands. These six races are Atsumi, Hiroshima, Kanto, Sasayama, and Touhoku. Each race originating from the region of Japan they are named after.
These newts are poisonous in the wild, however animals bred in captivity "may" lose their toxicity. The skin of the wild animals contains Tetrodotoxin (TTX), which is one of the most effective non-peptide toxins known to man. It is a neurotoxin, which has no known antidote and can cause death by suffocation in as little as six hours after ingestion. It is speculated that the toxin could be formed by environmental bacteria, and this could be the reason that some newts in captivity have a lower toxicity than their wild counterparts.
Read more about this topic: Japanese Fire Belly Newt
Famous quotes containing the word description:
“A sound mind in a sound body, is a short, but full description of a happy state in this World: he that has these two, has little more to wish for; and he that wants either of them, will be little the better for anything else.”
—John Locke (1632–1704)
“It is possible—indeed possible even according to the old conception of logic—to give in advance a description of all ‘true’ logical propositions. Hence there can never be surprises in logic.”
—Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951)
“The Sage of Toronto ... spent several decades marveling at the numerous freedoms created by a “global village” instantly and effortlessly accessible to all. Villages, unlike towns, have always been ruled by conformism, isolation, petty surveillance, boredom and repetitive malicious gossip about the same families. Which is a precise enough description of the global spectacle’s present vulgarity.”
—Guy Debord (b. 1931)