This little fellow was running around the peas in my garden the other morning. What a sight to see! He is a red-spotted newt, also known as a red-spotted eft or eastern newt. This particular newt has three life stages, including the aquatic larva or tadpole stage, the red eft or terrestrial juvenile stage, and the aquatic adult stage. In the photos, this amphibian is in the eft stage.
Eastern newts dwell in moist environments in both coniferous and deciduous forests, and in or around lakes and ponds. They love a muddy home! They avoid predators by secreting toxin through their skin.
You can see in the first photo how small these bright orange newts are when compared to my hand. From nose to tail, they are usually about 3-4 inches long. Efts eat a variety of foods, which may include spiders, caterpillars, flies and frog eggs.
Hi Meghan,
Just read this post the other day. I had never seen a Red-spotted Newt in the eft stage or any other stage for that matter, though I have seen other salamanders. Coincidentally, just today I saw my first Red-spotted Newt on the property and got two nice close-up pictures. Pretty cool. Thanks for the info which came just in time.
Mike
Hi Mike — glad to hear you saw a red-spotted newt and were able to ID it. Very cool! It's great to know people are reading the blog and learning from it. Thanks for sharing.