salamander

a kind of animal – amphibian (= animal that lives part of its life in water, especially the beginning stages, and then may move to land or stay in water or live in both water and land) – related to the frogs and toads, looks like (resembles) geckos and lizards – slender slimy body (different species in different colours), flat head with short snout (= mouth and nose part), mostly protruding small round eyes, short weak legs (some species with only two front legs and some others without legs) with four toes on the front feet and five toes on the hind (back) legs, without claws, placed on the sides of the body, long, slender, pointed tail; size: (varies widely), on average, 4-8 inches long (the smallest being the ‘minute salamander’ 1 inch long, and the largest being the ‘Chinese giant salamander’ 6 feet in length and 70 Kg. in weight); feeds on (eats) small species – very small water animals, the larvae of insects, the large species – small fish, earthworms, slugs, snails, and mice, shrews, etc; live for (most species) 50-55 years; about 500 species, including other very similar and closely related species, found in Europe, Americas and Asia, and only in some parts of Africa (?)

Some common groups of salamanders are: giant salamanders, Asiatic salamanders, mole salamanders, Pacific giant salamanders, lungless salamanders, torrent salamanders, cave salamanders,

{There are common local names given to each species in a group, for example, ‘spotted salamander’, ‘tiger salamander’, ‘olm’, ‘red back salamander’, etc.}

Special Features:

Several states in the USA have salamander as their state amphibian: ‘Red Hill salamander’ – Alabama State; ‘eastern tiger salamander’ – Illinois State; ‘barred tiger salamander’ – Kansas State; ‘spotted salamander’ – South Carolina State; ‘Tennessee cave salamander’ – Tennessee State.

The salamanders are a curious group of animals related to the frogs which spend most or some of their life, especially in the early stages, in water.

Some salamanders which live all their life on land have lungs to breath air; some salamanders which live all their life in water have gills to take in oxygen in water, like fish, and some others which live on land but goes into water for some period have lungs and gills, e.g. ‘olm’, and yet some others, in their adult stage, do not have either gills or lungs, they breath in with their skin!!

All salamanders need to keep their bodies wet and cool.  Though adults of some salamanders live entirely on land, they keep their bodies wet with a slimy substance produced from their skins.

Most of the salamanders lay eggs, but there are some species, such as ‘fire salamanders’ give birth to live young!

Salamanders cannot hear, and so cannot make any sounds!!

Figures of Speech:

1.

salamander (noun)  =

(a)

a mythical (imaginary) lizard-like creature supposed live in fire

(b)

a kind of cooking utensil

(c)

a metal rod with a handle used to stir a fire (wood or coal fire)

(d)

a portable stove used to heat or dry buildings under construction

2.

to salamander (verb)  =  to cook food in a salamander (cooking utensil)

3.

hot as if (he) had a bellyful of wasps and salamanders

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