? Alpine Newt
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia Phylum: Chordata Class: Lissamphibia Order: Caudata Family: Salamandridae Genus: Triturus Species: T. alpestris
Binomial name
Triturus alpestris (Laurenti, 1768)

The Alpine Newt (Triturus alpestris) belongs to the order Salamander (Urodela or Caudata) in the class of Amphibians. The alpine newt is one of five newts in Germany. Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (2616x1540, 128 KB) Description: Mesotriton alpestris ♀ Source: own photo. ... Scientific classification or biological classification is how biologists group and categorize extinct and living species of organisms (as opposed to folk taxonomy). ... Phyla Subregnum Parazoa Porifera (sponges) Subregnum Agnotozoa Placozoa (trichoplax) Orthonectida (orthonectids) Rhombozoa (rhombozoans) Subregnum Eumetazoa Radiata (unranked) (radial symmetry) Ctenophora (comb jellies) Cnidaria (coral, jellyfish, anemones) Bilateria (unranked) (bilateral symmetry) Acoelomorpha (basal) Orthonectida (parasitic to flatworms, echinoderms, etc. ... Typical Classes Subphylum Urochordata - Tunicatas Ascidiacea Thaliacea Larvacea Subphylum Cephalochordata - Lancelets Subphylum Myxini - Hagfishes Subphylum Vertebrata - Vertebrates Petromyzontida - Lampreys Placodermi (extinct) Chondrichthyes - Cartilaginous fishes Acanthodii (extinct) Actinopterygii - Ray-finned fishes Actinistia - Coelacanths Dipnoi - Lungfishes Amphibia - Amphibians Reptilia - Reptiles Aves - Birds Mammalia - Mammals Chordates (phylum Chordata) include the vertebrates, together with... Orders Anura Caudata Gymnophiona Allocaudata The subclass Lissamphibia includes all recent amphibians. ... Families Salamander is the common name applied to approximately 350 amphibian vertebrates with slender bodies, short legs, and long tails (order Caudata or Urodela). ... Genera   Chioglossa   Cynops   Echinotriton   Euproctus   Mertensiella   Neurergus   Notophthalmus   Pachytriton   Paramesotriton   Pleurodeles   Salamandra   Salamandrina   Taricha   Triturus   Tylototriton The family Salamandridae consists of true salamanders and newts. ... Species Alpine Newt()Iberian Newt()Italian Crested Newt()Northern Crested Newt()Danube Crested Newt()Southern Crested Newt()Marbled Newt()Pygmy Marbled Newt()Banded Newt()Smooth Newt() Triturus (from Triton, son of Poseidon and Greek: ura, tail) is a genus of newt, commonly known as the Crested Newt. ... In biology, binomial nomenclature is the formal method of naming species. ... Joseph Nicolai Laurenti (December 4, 1735 - February 17, 1805) was an Austrian naturalist. ... 1768 was a leap year starting on Friday (see link for calendar). ... Suborders Cryptobranchoidea Salamandroidea Sirenoidea Salamander is the common name applied to approximately 500 amphibian vertebrates with slender bodies, short legs, and long tails (order Caudata or Urodela). ... For other uses, see Amphibian (disambiguation). ...

Description

During the mating season early in the year, the males exhibit blue colouring on their backs; their flanks are stippled black and white, and on the belly are marked with a blue stripe. The shallow crest is alternately spotted yellow and black. The females, in water camouflage, are mottle grey-brown-green and have some weak spotting on the back. The belly side of both sexes is bright orange to vermillion and always unmarked. The biggest of the males can reach up to nine, and the females up to twelve, centimiters in length. After the mating season, older specimens have a darker, almost black, velvety skin (land camouflage).

Life and Habitat

The Alpine newt is typically inhabits forests with good access to water in hilly to mountainous regions. They are mostly absent in forest-poor areas. They populate well in thick deciduous forests, as well as parland and natural gardens. Outside the spawning seaon, the Alpine Newt is a land animal. During the day it stays in all kinds of undergrowth, but during the mating season in cool water (forest pools, artificial pools). After the adults come out of winter dormancy, the Alpine Newts immediately take themselves to the spawning pools.

Location

The spread of the alpine newt is constricted to Central Europe and parts of mountainous Southern Europe as well as an isolated area on the Iberian Peninsula. Regions of Europe Central Europe is the region lying between the variously and vaguely defined areas of Eastern and Western Europe. ... Current division of Europe into five (or more) regions: one definition of Southern Europe is marked in green Southern Europe is a region of the European continent, typically referring to European territories with coastline on the Mediterranean Sea. ... The Iberian Peninsula, or Iberia, is located in the extreme southwest of Europe. ...

Endangerment

After a steep decline in the newt population in the 1960s-70s, they have apparently recovered their numbers. Surveillance in the surrounding area of Cologne (approximately 50m above sea level) pointed particularly toward an increase in alpine newt numbers, whereas the numbers of newts in breeding pools seemed to decline. In home gardens, newts are settling in pools in which there can be a high reproduction rate. If fish are maintain in these ponds, the population even in larger ponds will be completely wipedout. However, a small pool of 150 litres volume had more than 60 Alpine Newt larvae of different sizes contained within it at the beginning of July 2003. They were likely spawned from just one female. [1] Cologne Cathedral with Hohenzollern Bridge Cologne (German: (help· info) ; Kölsch: Kölle) is Germanys fourth-largest city after Berlin, Hamburg and Munich and is the largest city both in the German Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the largest...

Taxonomy

The Alpine Newt has been usually placed into the Triturus genus. Found in 1946 by taxonomic scientist penis mcgee, he split the genus Triturus into three, and placed the Alpine Newt into its own genus Mesotriton. Also the subspecies T. a. inexpectatus was elevated to species status. However this split hasn't been completely accepted yet. Originally 9 subspecies of the Alpine Newt were recognized.

• T. a. alpestris (Laurenti, 1768) Alpine Newt
• T. a. apuanus (Gray, 1850) Italian Alpine Newt
• T. a. cyreni (Mertens & Muller, 1940) Spanish Alpine Newt
• T. a. lacusnigri (Dely, 1960) Yugoslavian Alpine Newt
• T. a. montenegrinus (Radovanovic, 1951) Montenegran Alpine Newt
• T. a. piperianus (Radovanovic, 1961)
• T. a. serdarus (Radovanovic, 1961)
• T. a. inexpectatus (Dubois & Breuil, 1983) Calabrian Alpine Newt
• T. a. veluchiensis (Wolterstorff, 1935) Greek Alpine Newt

References

Note 1: García-París, M., A. Montori, and P. Herrero. 2004. Amphibia: Lissamphibia. Fauna Iberica Vol. 24. Madrid: Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales and Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas.